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THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

RIVERSIDE 


Shelburne  Essays 


By 

Paul  Elmer  More 


Sixth  Series 


[Studies  of  Religious  Dualism] 


"  Manichaeism  may  be  disavowed  in  words.      It  cannot  be  exiled  from 
the  actual  belief  of  mankind." — Sir  Leslie  Stephen. 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New   York  and  London 

^be  fjnlcfterbocftec  press 

1909 


CoiYRIGHT,    1909 
BY 

PAUL  ELMER  MORE 


TCbe  "lintclicrbocfter  press,  "Bew  HJorli 


ADVERTISEMENT 


The  first  of  these  essays  appeared  originally  in  the 
Atlantic  Monthly;  the  Saint  Augustine  in  the  Hibbert 
Journal;  the  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  the  Bunyan,  and 
the  Rousseau  in  the  Nation  and  New  York  Evening 
Post;  the  Socrates  and  The  Apology,  together  with 
the  Crito  and  the  closing  scene  of  the  Phcedo,  in  a  little 
volume  of  the  Riverside  Literature  Series  under  the 
title  of  The  Judgment  of  Socrates.  The  other  three 
essays  have  not  before  been  printed.  As  usual  I 
have  altered  and  added  considerably  in  lifting  the 
articles  from  magazine  to  book.  I  may  add  that 
I  had  the  pleasure  of  reading  three  of  these  essays, 
together  with  two  others  not  printed,  in  the  course 
of  lectures  given  this  year  at  the  University  of  Cin- 
cinnati to  inaugurate  a  new  chair  of  comparative 
literature. 


ui 


CONTENTS 

The  Forest  Philosophy  of  India 

PAGB 
I 

The  Bhagavad  GtrA 

.      43 

Saint  Augustine 

.      65 

Pascal    . 

.     lOI 

Sir  Thomas  Browne 

.    154 

Bunyan  . 

.    187 

Rousseau 

.   214 

Socrates 

.   242 

The  Apology  . 

•   274 

Plato      .... 

.    321 

SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

SIXTH  SERIES 
[STUDIES  OF  RELIGIOUS  DUALISM] 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA 

A  TRANSLATION  of  Deussen's  Philosophy  of 
the  Upanishads^  will  be  welcomed  by  all  who 
have  been  familiar  with  this  learned  work  in  the 
original,  and  who  hold  it  important  that  accu- 
rate notions  of  the  Orient  should  be  disseminated. 
As  an  analytic,  and  to  a  certain  degree  con- 

»  The  Philosophy  of  the  Upanishads.  By  Paul  Deus- 
sen.  Authorised  English  translation  by  Rev.  A.  S. 
Geden.  New  York:  Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  1906. 
This  forms  in  the  original  the  second  volume  of  Profes- 
sor Deussen's  Allgemeine  Geschichte  der  Philosophie. 
Other  works  by  him  dealing  with  India  are :  Das  Sys- 
tem des  Ved&nta,  Die  SUtras  des  Veddnta,  and  Sechzig 
Upanishad's  des  Veda. 

1 


2  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

structive,  critic  of  Hindu  philosophy,  Professor 
Deussen  is  easily  foremost  among  Western 
scholars.  He  has  perceived  more  clearly  than 
any  one  else  the  high  position  of  that  philosophy 
in  the  long  struggle  of  the  human  spirit  to  come 
to  its  own;  he  has  traced  the  development  of 
ideas,  from  the  early  guesses  of  Vedic  days 
down  to  the  stupendous  system  of  Qankara,  in 
a  masterly  manner.  It  would  be  presumptuous 
in  me  to  assume  a  knowledge  of  Indian  thought, 
or  of  metaphysics  generally,  comparable  to 
his;  and  it  would  be  disingenuous  to  deny 
that  what  knowledge  I  possess  is  in  part  de- 
rived from  the  books  I  am  about  to  criticise. 
Nevertheless  it  seems  worth  while  to  look  at 
his  vast  collection  of  material  in  a  somewhat 
different  light,  at  least  to  shift  the  emphasis 
in  summing  up  our  final  impression  of  that 
Forest  Philosophy,  which,  from  the  age  of 
Alexander  to  the  present,  has  been  the  periodic 
wonder  of  the  world.  When  he  comes  to  deal 
with  the  elaborate  superstructure  which  Ba- 
darayana  and  later  (circa  750  a.d.)  Qankara, 
the  Doctor  Angelicus  of  India,  raised  on  the 
foundation  of  the  Veda,  I,  for  one,  can  only 
stand  and  admire.  But  it  is  just  a  question 
whether  the  ability,  or,  better,  the  predilection, 
which  fitted  him  to  write  the  System  des  Veddnta, 
did  not  in  a  measure  unfit  him  to  interpret  the 
more  naive  and  unsystematic  stammerings  of 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA       3 

the  Upanishads.  It  may  be  a  question  whether 
the  effect  of  his  work  on  those  earlier  treatises 
is  not — despite  his  own  protests  to  the  contrary 
— to  convert  into  hard  intellectualism  what  was 
at  bottom  a  religious  and  thoroughly  human 
experience. 

The  point  is  fundamental,  and  calls  for  in- 
sistence. There  is  a  proposition  in  the  Ethics  of 
Spinoza  (I.  xi.)  to  this  effect:  "God,  or  sub- 
stance consisting  of  infinite  attributes,  each  of 
which  expresses  eternal  and  infinite  essence, 
necessarily  exists."  Which  is  as  much  as  to 
say:  The  definition  which  I  give  of  God  in- 
cludes existence,  therefore  it  is  absurd  for  me 
to  deny  that  He  exists.  So,  briefly,  runs  the 
famous  ontological  argument  which  in  one 
form  or  another  has  wrought  a  kind  of  meta- 
physical insanity.  A  hundred  times  it  has  been 
exorcised,  and  a  hundred  times  it  has  risen  like 
an  ill-laid  ghost  to  trouble  the  brains  of  men. 
The  great  service  of  Kant  professedly  was  to 
lay  this  phantom  once  for  all,  and  to  show  that 
what  exists  in  the  reason  does  not  necessarily 
exist  in  fact;  but  his  heart  failed  him.  As 
Heine  says,  no  sooner  did  he  destroy  the  old 
phantom  of  deism  with  his  critique  of  pure 
reason,  than  with  the  practical  reason  as  with 
a  magic  wand  he  brought  the  corpse  to  life 
again.  One  thing  is  sure:  before  we  can  un- 
derstand, though  but   dimly,  the  language  of 


4  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

India's  sacred  books,  we  must  utterly  abandon 
the  lying  dragoman  of  modem  intellectualism. 
Deussen  himself  is  still  bound  in  these  shackles, 
and,  with  all  his  contortions,  cannot  escape 
that  first  fatal  step:  "I  think,  therefore  I  am." 
The  very  name,  forest  philosophers,  shows  how 
far  they  were  from  the  lecture-room.  There 
is  in  the  earlier,  and  more  genuine,  Upanishads 
no  articulated  body  of  thought,  but  rather 
the  almost  childlike  gropings  of  the  practical 
mystic  to  express  in  language  the  meaning  of 
his  inner  life.  Much  of  the  older  theology, 
much  of  the  grotesque  symbolism  remains, 
with  not  a  little  that  is  the  mere  hocus-pocus 
of  magical  words.  And  then,  suddenly,  out 
of  this  verbiage,  there  strikes  up  a  phrase,  a 
passage,  that  comes  from  the  seldom-speaking 
recesses  of  the  heart  and  carries  the  unmistak- 
able accent  of  an  ancient  and  profound  national 
experience. 

To  grasp  the  force  of  these  books  we  must 
go  back  to  the  time  of  the  Vedas  and  store  our 
memory  with  those  earliest  hymns  of  the  Aryan 
race.  There  we  shall  find  expressed  the  confused 
mythology  of  a  people  to  whom  the  spectacle 
of  nature  was  a  divine  wonder.  More  specially 
their  hymns  were  shot  through  with  the  glories 
and  terrors  of  the  sky, — the  splendour  of  the 
dawn  spreading  out  her  white  garments  over 
the  darkness,  the  night  dressing  herself  in  beauty 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA       5 

and  gazing  upon  the  earth  with  innumerable 
eyes,  the  clouds  rolling  out  of  the  cavern  of 
the  horizon  and  huddling  away  into  some  far- 
off  retreat,  the  fearful  tumult  of  the  Oriental 
tempest  with  its  thunderbolts  crashing  through 
the  curtain  of  gloom,  the  wind  riding  its  loud- 
creaking  chariot,  and  over  all  the  motion- 
less, divine,  immeasurable  circle  of  the  highest 
heaven, — 

There  in  his  garment  all  of  gold, 
With  jewels  decked,  sits  Varuna, 
And  round  about  him  sit  his  spies. 

To  the  devout  Hindu  all  this  was  a  celestial 
drama  of  the  gods.  The  dawn  is  a  bride  decked 
in  her  glistening  marriage  robes;  wild  horsemen 
ride  through  the  sky;  in  the  shadow  of  the 
storm  Indra  and  the  demon  for  ever  renew 
their  tremendous  duel.  In  the  midst  of  these 
powers  man  felt  his  own  supreme  littleness. 
I  do  not  know  what  the  universal  origin  of 
sacrifice  may  be,  whether  from  a  desire  to  pro- 
pitiate the  gods,  or  to  strike  a  bargain  with  them, 
or  from  some  other  primeval  instinct;  but  in 
India  in  these  days  it  should  seem  in  its  purest 
form  to  have  been  an  effort  of  the  human  being 
to  escape  the  fragility  and  isolation  of  his  lot 
and  to  connect  his  life  with  the  overwhelming 
activities  of  nature.     Only  so,  indeed,  can  the 


6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

symbolism  of  the  ritual  be  understood.  Every 
step  in  the  sacrifice — the  form  of  the  altar,  the 
kindling  of  the  fire,  the  preparation  of  the  vic- 
tim, the  hymns,  the  least  attitude  of  the  priest 
— was  supposed  to  be  the  counterpart  of  the 
drama  of  nature  and  the  gods.  More  par- 
ticularly this  is  made  evident  by  the  double 
office  of  Agni  (ignis,  fire).  It  will  have  been 
observed  that  in  all  the  phenomena  of  the  sky 
the  imagination  of  the  Hindu  was  most  im- 
pressed by  the  element  of  light  and  fire,  whether 
in  the  alternations  of  night  and  day  or  in  the 
flaming  arrows  of  the  tempest.  Agni  is  the 
sun,  the  immortal  energy  of  the  gods,  the  giver 
of  life  and  abundance,  the  terrible  destroyer; 
he  dwells  aloft  in  the  heavens,  and  he  is  also 
concealed  in  the  vital  sap  of  earthly  plants. 
Here  lay  the  hold  of  the  priest.  In  the  altar 
flame  he  not  only  reproduced  the  life  of  the 
gods  by  eliciting  the  sacred  element  from  its 
sheath,  but  by  the  force  of  analogy  controlled 
the  celestial  phenomena,  "  Agni  is  light,  light 
is  Agni";  and  again,  "  The  sun  is  light,  light 
is  the  sun,"  chanted  the  priest  at  the  evening 
and  morning  service  of  the  fire;  and  one  of  the 
sacrificial  books  says  more  particularly:  "When 
the  priest  in  the  morning  before  the  rising  of 
the  sun  makes  his  offering,  he  brings  the  sun  to 
birth,  and  the  sun,  filling  out  his  orb  of  light, 
rises  in  radiance.     Of  a  truth  he  would  not  rise, 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA        7 

should  the  priest  fail  to  make  this  offering  in  the 
sacrificial  fire.  "^ 

We  see  in  this  strange  symbolism  of  the 
sacrifice  how  gradually  the  worship  and  marvel 
of  the  world  are  subdued  to  the  heart  of  man; 
it  is  a  slow  process  of  absorption,  one  might 
say,  corresponding  to  the  growth  of  introspection 
and  self-knowledge.  In  this  way  only  can  we 
understand  the  hold  of  that  prayer  which  for 
thousands  of  years  has  been  in  the  mouth  of 
every  pious  Hindu :  "  Tat  Savitur  varenyam — 
May  we  by  meditation  win  that  desired  glory  of 
the  Sun,  of  the  divine  one  who  shall  inspire  our 
prayers!"  At  first,  no  doubt,  this  was  nothing 
more  than  the  customary  plea  for  worldly 
honour  and  success,  but  with  time  its  meaning, 
or  intention,  changed,  and  it  came  to  express 
the  hunger  of  the  soul  to  feel  within  itself  the 
fulness  of  the  miracle  of  being,  Agni,  the  ma- 
terial fire,  becomes  identified  with  brahma,  the 
swelling  and  aspiration  of  the  heart  in  prayer; 
and  by  a  natural  transition  we  pass  to  tapas, 
the  heat  and  glow  of  devotion  by  asceticism. 

'  Thoreau,  in  the  fields  about  Concord,  said  something 
very  similar:     "Day  would  not  dawn  if  it  were  not  for 

THE  INWARD  MORNING. 

Packed  in  my  mind  lie  all  the  clothes 

Which  outward  nature  wears, 
And  in  its  fashion's  hourly  change 

It  all  things  else  repairs." 


8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

We  have  thus  the  three  periods  of  Hindu 
religion,  represented  by  the  early  worship  of 
wonder  and  fear,  the  symbolic  assumption  of 
divine  powers  in  the  ritual,  and  the  relin- 
quishing of  the  symbol  for  the  self-sufficient 
life  of  the  spirit.  Our  concern  is  with  this  latest 
development. 

As  the  theory  and  practice  of  sacrifice  became 
more  complex,  the  tyranny  of  the  Brahmans, 
or  priests  who  alone  could  perform  the  rites, 
extended  itself  more  and  more  over  all  the 
activities  of  man;  and  there  sprang  up  about 
the  ritual  a  peculiar  priestly  literature,  the 
Brahmanas.  The  world  has  seen  nothing  else 
quite  comparable  to  the  awful  intricacies  of 
that  religion.  It  permeated  life  to  the  minutest 
recesses;  it  developed  into  a  monstrous,  incon- 
ceivable oppression,  and  yet  it  had  also  its 
beneficent  side.  It  contained  the  basis  of  a 
masterful  discipline ;  teaching  men  to  regard  their 
selfish  desires  and  interests  as  trivial  in  com- 
parison with  those  religious  acts  which  pointed, 
however  crudely  and  viciously,  to  divine  laws. 
Out  of  that  priestly  despotism  the  race  might 
have  come  with  blunted  moral  sense,  spiritually 
debased  and  engrossed  in  superstition;  and 
such  an  influence  many  people  would  regard 
as  at  work  in  India  to-day,  forgetting  that 
political  and  racial  subversions  hardly  permit 
us  to  reckon  on  a  continuity  of  religious  forces. 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA       Q 

Certainly,  for  a  time,  and  on  the  more  elastic 
spirits,  this  discipline  induced  a  powerful  re- 
action, which,  as  happens  when  the  discipline 
is  genuine,  retained  what  was  valuable  in  the 
older  forms  while  induing  them  with  new 
significance. 

There  had  already  sprung  up  under  Brahman- 
ical  rule  the  regular  division  of  a  man's  life  into 
three  stages,  as  student,  householder,  anchorite. 
From  his  twelfth  to  his  twenty-fourth  year  (or 
for  a  more  indefinite  period)  the  young  Brahman 
was  to  dwell  in  the  house  of  a  teacher,  serving 
him  in  menial  offices  and  storing  up  in  memory 
the  vast  body  of  sacred  literature.  After  this  his 
second  duty  was  to  marry  and  create  a  family 
of  his  own,  and  thus  to  carry  on  the  inheritance 
of  religion  for  himself  and  for  others.  But 
with  the  consciousness  in  the  Hindu  mind  of  a 
deep-seated  discord  between  the  demands  of 
daily  life  and  the  growth  in  spiritual  power, 
these  duties  of  the  householder  and  represen- 
tative priest  inevitably  grew  irksome  in  the  end 
and  called  for  a  time  of  reparation.  Hence, 
when  a  man's  sons  were  grown  and  ready  to 
assume  the  traditional  routine,  when  he  beheld 
his  sons'  sons  about  him,  he  was  free  to  shake 
off  the  burden  and  retire  for  repose  and  inner 
recreation  to  the  sacred  places  of  the  wilderness. 
Later,  under  the  impulse  of  a  doubtful  asceti- 
cism, a  fourth  stage  separated  itself  from  this 


lO  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

period  of  retreat.  When  the  consummation 
was  foreseen,  the  hermit  was  to  take  up  his  staff 
and  walk  straight  onward,  begging  his  way, 
until  death  brought  him  release.  This  fourth 
regimen  never  obtained  general  acceptance 
and,  indeed,  it  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  so 
rigid  an  apportionment  of  life  as  was  implied 
by  the  three  stages  became  ever  a  universal 
practice.  It  was  an  ideal  always,  but  an  ideal, 
as  both  history  and  literature  attest,  that  was 
realised  by  innumerable  men  and  women. 

The  heart  of  the  matter  for  us  lies  in  the 
third  period  of  forest  life,  wliich  was  in  part 
a  fulfilment  of  the  priestly  discipline,  and  very 
early  in  part  also  a  means  of  escape  from  the 
intolerable  religious  routine.  Nor  must  we 
suppose  that  for  most  of  these  eremites,  despite 
the  horrid  austerities  of  a  few,  existence  was 
excessively  harsh  or  even  lonely.  A  hut  thrown 
up  on  the  banks  of  some  stream  or  lake,  often 
on  the  picturesque  slope  of  hill  or  mountain, 
gave  all  the  shelter  that  was  needed  in  that 
warm  climate,  and  food  was  abundant  and  free. 
Often  they  dwelt  in  companies,  under  the  guid- 
ance of  some  authoritative  saint ;  and  if  we  were 
to  look  for  a  comparison  in  the  Western  world 
we  should  go,  not,  perhaps,  to  the  stem  ancho- 
rites of  the  Thebais,  but  to  the  group  of  holy 
men  who  gathered  about  Port-Royal  des  Champs 
in  the  time  of  its  purest  and  most  untroubled 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     II 

enthusiasm.  Only,  there  is  a  touch  of  Oriental 
richness  in  these  Indian  scenes  not  to  be  found 
in  the  neighbourhood  of  Paris  and  Versailles. 
The  drama  and  epic  of  India  are  filled  with 
really  charming  pictures  of  the  life  of  com- 
mingled society  and  solitude,  such  as  is  shown 
in  this  speech  of  an  aged  sanctified  woman  to 
the  wife  of  Rama: 

But  now  the  sun  has  sunk  from  sight. 
And  left  the  world  to  holy  Night. 
Hark!  how  the  leafy  thickets  sound 
With  gathering  birds  that  twitter  round : 
They  sought  their  food  by  day,  and  all 
Flock  homeward  when  the  shadows  fall. 
See,  hither  comes  the  hermit  band, 
Each  with  his  pitcher  in  his  hand: 
Fresh  from  the  bath,  their  locks  are  wet. 
Their  coats  of  bark  are  dripping  yet. 
Here  saints  their  fires  of  worship  tend. 
And  curling  wreaths  of  smoke  ascend : 
Borne  on  the  flames  they  mount  above. 
Dark  as  the  brown  wings  of  the  dove. 
The  distant  trees,  though  well-nigh  bare, 
Gloom  thickened  by  the  evening  air. 
And  in  the  faint  uncertain  light 
Shut  the  horizon  from  our  sight. 
The  beasts  that  prowl  in  darkness  rove 
On  every  side  about  the  grove. 
And  the  tame  deer,  at  ease  reclined. 
Their  shelter  near  the  altars  find. 
The  night  o'er  all  the  sky  is  spread, 
With  lunar  stars  engarlanded, 
And  risen  in  his  robes  of  light 


12  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

The  moon  is  beautifully  bright. 

Now  to  thy  lord  I  bid  thee  go: 

Thy  pleasant  tale  has  charmed  me  SO : 

One  thing  alone  I  needs  must  pray, 

Before  me  first  thyself  array : 

Here  in  thy  heavenly  raiment  shine, 

And  glad,  dear  love,  these  eyes  of  mine.* 

It  was  in  fact  no  unusual  thing  for  a  man 
to  take  his  wife,  or  even  his  children,  with  him 
into  the  forest;  and  in  general  one  gets  the 
impression  that  life  among  these  colonies  was 
more  wholesome  than  in  our  own  monasteries 
of  the  Middle  Ages.  Learned  women,  whether 
as  inquirers  or  as  disputants,  played  a  sufficient 
part  in  that  great  religious  drama;  and  one  of 
these  is  celebrated  in  what  is,  perhaps,  the  oldest 
of  the  Upanishads : 

Yajnavalkya  had  two  wives,  Maitreyt  and  KAty^- 
yani.  Of  these  Maitreyi  was  interested  in  religious  talk, 
but  Katyayani  possessed  only  woman's  knowledge. 
Now  Yajnavalkya  was  preparing  to  enter  another 
stage  of  life,  in  the  forest. 

"Maitreyi,"  said  he,  "I  am  going  away  from  this 
my  house.  Come  then,  let  me  make  a  settlement 
between  Katyayant  and  thee." 

Then   said   Maitreyi,     "  My  lord,   were  this   whole 

» This  passage  of  the  Rdntdyana  is  from  the  ex- 
cellent version  by  R.  T.  H.  Griffith,  which  might 
well  be  rendered  more  accessible  to  English  readers. 
In  quoting  from  the  Upanishads  I  have  based  my 
translation  on  Max  Mtiller's,  but  with  the  original 
text  and  Deussen's  Sechzig  Upanishad's  before  my  eye. 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     13 

earth  mine  with  all  its  wealth,  tell  me,  should  I,  or 
should  I  not,  be  made  immortal  thereby?" — "Not 
so,"  replied  Yajnavalkya;  "like  the  life  of  the  rich 
would  thy  life  be.  There  is  no  hope  of  immortality 
through  wealth.  " 

And  Maitreyi  said:  "What  should  I  do  with  that 
which  cannot  make  me  immortal  ?  What  my  lord 
surely  knoweth,  that  tell  thou  me." 

And  Yajnavalkya  replied:  "Thou  wast  indeed  dear 
to  me,  but  now  even  dearer.  Therefore,  if  it  please 
thee,  lady,  I  will  explain  this  matter,  and  do  thou 
mark  well  what  I  say.  " 

And  he  said:  "Verily,  not  for  the  love  of  husband 
is  the  husband  dear;  but  for  love  of  the  Self  the  husband 
is  dear.  Verily,  not  for  the  love  of  wife  is  the  wife 
dear;  but  for  love  of  the  Self  the  wife  is  dear. 
Verily,  not  for  the  love  of  sons  are  the  sons  dear;  but 
for  love  of  the  Self  sons  are  dear.  Verily,  not  for  the 
love  of  wealth  is  wealth  dear;  but  for  love  of  the  Self 
wealth  is  dear.  .  .  .  Verily,  not  for  the  love  of  gods  are 
the  gods  dear;  but  for  love  of  the  Self  the  gods  are  dear." 

The  doctrine  is  not  easy,  and  it  is  not  sur- 
prising that  Maitreyi  cries  out,  "Sir,  thou  hast 
utterly  bewildered  me,  and  I  know  not  what 
to  make  of  this  Self."  Yajnavalkya,  we  are 
told,  went  away  into  the  forest.  He  was  the 
oracle  of  many  restless  souls  who  were  then 
wandering  about  in  search  of  the  secret  know- 
ledge. Of  Maitreyi  no  more  is  said,  but  one 
imagines  her  going  into  the  woods  with  her 
husband  and  talking  with  him  interminably  on 
these  high  themes.  And  one  gets  here  a  glimpse 
of  the  kind  of  questions  that  had  come  to  dis- 


14  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

turb  the  religious  peace  of  India.     Especially 
when  released  from  the  heavy  routine  of  observ- 
ances, in   the  forest  where  the  worshipper  was 
permitted  to  substitute  a  mental  devotion  for 
all,  or  at  least  for  the  burdensome  part,  of  the 
ceremonial,  he  began  to  consider  more  closely 
the  meaning  of  the  elaborate  servitude  he  had 
undergone,  to  ask  himself  what  correspondence 
could  be  found  between  the  outer  and  the  inner 
reality,  and  the  value  of  what  he  had  outgrown. 
In  this  fermentation  of  thought  it  is  natural 
that  the  Kshatriyas,  or  ruling  caste,  who  had 
always  been  outside  the  secret  of  the  ceremonial, 
should  appear  on  the  whole  to  have  been  the 
leaders    of    the    friendly    revolt,    whereas    the 
priestly    caste    of    Brahmans,    whose    influence 
and  very  existence  depended  on  the  physical 
sacrifice,    should   have   been   the   learners   and 
followers.     And  the  manner  in  which  the  new 
faith    spread    is    sufficiently    clear.     Here    and 
there  to  some  lonely  thinker  the  swathing  bands 
of  prescription  fell  away  and  exposed  to  his 
view  the  innermost  core  of  his  spiritual  exper- 
ience.    He  would  give  a  name  to  this  reality, 
a  kind  of  catchword  which  passed  from  mouth 
to  mouth,  and  inquirers,  hearing  the  word  and 
half  understanding  its  meaning,   would  travel 
to  the  sage  with  their  questions.     It  is  evident 
that    those    who    had    attained    enlightenment 
expounded  their  vision  only  under  precautions. 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     I  5 

If  the  questioner  showed  that  something  in  his 
own  life  corresponded  to   the   progress  of  the 
sage,  if  it  appeared  that  the  exposition  of  the 
secret  word  would  be  a  reality  to  him, — neither 
a  vain  syllogism  of  the  reason  nor  a  pretext  for 
contempt  of  duty, — then  in  some  metaphor  or 
some  quaint  dialectic  the  teacher  would  lead 
him  to  trace  back  the  steps  of  his  own  experience 
until  he  reached  the  innermost  source  of  truth. 
Thus  the  doctrine  was  arahasyam,  or  upanishad, 
a  secret   (for  this  is  the  real  meaning  of  the 
word),    which    gradually    spread    itself    among 
these    forest-dwellers.     After    a    while    it    was 
written  down  in  books,  not  without  large  ad- 
mixture of  outworn  mythologies  and  popular 
superstitions,  and  in  this  form  was  at  last  taken 
up  by  the  more  orthodox  Brahmans  into  their 
ritualistic  writings.     As  a  secret  doctrine  these 
treatises  were  called  Upanishads;  as  a  portion 
of   the   literature    designed   for  the   forest   life 
they  were  Aranyakas  {aranya,  forest) ;  as  form- 
ing the  conclusion  of  the  sacred  canon  they  were 
the  Vedanta,  the  Veda-End  {Veda,  specifically 
the    early  collections  of   sacrificial  hymns,  ge- 
nerically  the  whole  religious  canon;  aw/a,  end). 
In  all  this  it  cannot  be  too  often  repeated 
that  a  definite  moral  and  spiritual  experience 
is  the  true  basis,  that  the  rationalising  theories 
come  afterwards,  that  in  a  certain  sense  ration- 
alism is  a  contradiction  of  what  it  undertakes 


l6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

to  expound,  and  flourishes  only  when  the 
reality  has  begun  to  fade  away.  In  our  own 
civilisation  we  know  that  deism,  or  rationalism, 
was  fundamentally  a  denial  of  the  religion  it 
sought  to  bolster  up;  and  so  in  India  the  later 
syllogistic  aphorisms  of  Badarayana,  through 
which  Professor  Deussen  has  approached  the 
Upanishads,  indicate  the  beginning  of  an  inner 
petrifaction.  Perhaps  the  surest  way  to  avoid 
this  fallacy  of  the  reason  would  be  to  eschew 
the  metaphysical  path  altogether.  Instead  of 
starting  with  a  comparison  of  the  transcendental 
unreality  underlying  the  thought  of  Kant  and 
Plato  and  the  Vedanta,  after  the  manner  of 
our  learned  guide,  ^  one  might  look  first  for  the 

>  The  attitude  of  Professor  Deussen  is  fairly  repre- 
sented by  a  passage  in  the  section  treating  of  The 
Conception  of  the  Upanishads  in  its  Relation  to 
Rehgion: 

"The  thought  referred  to,  common  to  India,  Plato, 
and  Kant,  that  the  entire  universe  is  only  appearance 
and  not  reality,  forms  not  only  the  special  and  most 
important  theme  of  all  philosophy,  but  is  also  the 
presumption  and  conditio  sine  qua  non  of  all  religion. 
All  great  religious  teachers  therefore,  whether  in  ear- 
lier or  later  times,  nay  even  all  those  at  the  present  day 
whose  religion  rests  upon  faith,  are  alike  unconsciously 
followers  of  Kant.     This  we  propose  briefly  to  prove. 

"The  necessary  premises  of  all  religion  are,  as  Kant 
frequently  expounds: — (i)  The  existence  of  God, 
(2)  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  (3)  the  freedom  of  the 
will  (without  which  no  morality  is  possible).     These 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     I  7 

truth  of  the  Upanishads  in  the  vivid  conscious- 
ness of  a  dualism  felt  in  the  daily  habit  of 
humanity;  adding — with  some  temerity,  no 
doubt — that  the  degree  of  clearness  with  which 

three  essential  conditions  of  man's  salvation — God, 
immortality,  and  freedom — are  conceivable  only  if 
the  universe  is  mere  appearance  and  not  reality  (mere 
mdyd  and  not  the  dtman),  and  they  break  down  irre- 
trievably should  this  empirical  reality,  wherein  we 
live,  be  found  to  constitute  the  true  essence  of  things. 

"  (i)  The  existence  of  God  will  be  precluded  by  that 
of  space,  which  is  infinite,  and  therefore  admits  of 
nothing  external  to  itself,  and  nothing  within  save 
that  which  fills  it,  i.  e.  matter  (the  most  satisfactory 
definition  of  which  is  "that  which  fills  space"). 

"  (2)  Immortality  will  be  precluded  by  the  conditions 
of  time,  in  consequence  of  which  our  existence  has  a 
beginning  in  time  by  conception  and  birth,  and  an  end 
in  time  by  death;  and  this  end  is  absolute,  in  so  far 
as  that  beginning  was  absolute. 

"  (3)  Freedom,  and  with  it  the  possibility  of  moral 
action,  will  be  precluded  by  the  universal  validity  of 
the  law  of  causality,  as  shown  by  experience;  for  this 
requires  that  every  effect,  consequently  every  human 
action,  should  be  the  necessary  result  of  causes  which 
precede  the  action,  and  which  therefore  in  the  actual 
moment  of  action  are  no  longer  within  our  control." 

It  would  not  be  easy  to  state  in  fewer  words  the  com- 
mon intellectual  basis  of  the  Vedanta,  of  Plato,  and 
of  Kant.  Analytically  there  is  nothing  to  censure. 
Yet  from  another  point  of  view  it  is  possible  to  say 
that,  as  a  preparation  for  understanding  the  Upani- 
shads, the  critical  qualities  of  such  a  passage  start  the 
reader  in  a  wrong  frame  of  mind. 


l8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

this  dualism  has  been  perceived  marks  the 
depth  of  any  religion  or  philosophy.  Reli- 
gion, one  would  say,  was  just  the  acceptance 
of  this  cleavage  in  our  nature  as  a  fact,  despite 
the  cavilling  of  the  intellect,  together  with  a  be- 
lief that  the  gulf  may  be  bridged  over  by  some 
effort  of  the  will,  by  self-surrender  to  a  power  in 
one  sense  or  another  not  ourselves.  Philosophy 
is  an  attempt  to  explain  away  this  dualism  ra- 
tionally, and  literature,  in  its  higher  vocation  at 
least,  often  asserts  the  same  prerogative  by  virtue 
of  the  imagination.  But  in  one  way  or  another, 
by  the  fervor  of  acceptance,  by  the  very  vehe- 
mence of  denial,  by  the  earnestness  of  the  en- 
deavour to  escape  it,  this  dualism  lies  at  the 
bottom  of  our  inner  life,  and  the  spiritual 
history  of  the  human  race  might  be  defined  as 
the  long  writhing  and  posturing  of  the  soul  (I 
mean  something  more  than  the  mere  intellect, — 
the  whole  essential  man,  indeed)  to  conceal,  or 
deny,  or  ridicule,  or  overcome,  this  cleft  in  its 
nature.  ^ 

In  pure  religion  this  struggle  arises  most  com- 
monly from  a  conviction  of  sin.  Man  feels  his 
own  responsibility  for  the  chasm  in  his  nature, 

'  I  am  aware  of  the  ambiguities  attaching  to  the 
word  nature,  and  if  sometimes  in  these  essays  it  is  used 
to  signify  the  whole  of  man's  being  and  other  times 
only  his  lower  tendencies,  I  trust  the  context  to  make 
its  meaning  clear. 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     IQ 

and  this  responsibility  he  symbolises  in  a  thou- 
sand ways — in  the  fable  of  the  Fall,  in  the 
doctrine  of  universal  depravity,  in  the  terror 
of  fetichism,  in  propitiatory  rites,  in  the  whole 
structure  of  mythology  we  may  say.  The 
story  of  Gethsemane  clothes  it  in  its  most 
beautiful  and  most  tragic  garb.  It  matters 
little  whether  we  adopt  the  mythological  ex- 
planation and  say  that  Jesus  actually  bore 
through  his  divine  humiliation  the  sins  of  the 
world,  or  whether,  more  rationalistically,  we 
say  that  he  was  weighed  down  with  sympathy 
for  the  universal  curse  of  evil;  those  prayers 
beneath  the  olive  trees  in  the  silence  and  lone- 
liness of  night,  that  agony  and  bloody  sweat, 
are  witnesses  to  the  consciousness  in  one  great 
soul  of  the  division  in  man  and  of  the  need 
to  attain  to  atonement  by  sacrificing  one  half 
of  our  nature.  That  acceptance  of  pain  was 
the  tapas,  or  asceticism,  of  the  Indian  sages,  the 
inner  heat  or  fire,  as  the  word  signifies,  which 
was  to  bum  away  the  body  of  despair.  It  is 
not  fashionable  in  these  days  to  preach  the 
gospel  of  suffering,  we  choose  rather  the  anaes- 
thesia of  brotherly  love;  but  still  at  the  bottom 
of  Christianity,  rising  to  the  surface  with  every 
serious  stirring  of  the  religious  sense,  is  this 
consciousness  of  sin,  and  that  resurgent  cry 
of  the  Christ,  "My  soul  is  exceeding  sorrowful, 
even  unto  death";  with  its  echo  in  the  mouth 


20  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of    his    greatest    disciple,    "Who    shall    deliver 
me  from  the  body  of  this  death?" 

The  irresistible  tendency  of  religion  has  been 
to  project  this  dualism  of  consciousness  into 
the  supersensible  realm  and  to  create  a  my- 
thology, the  near  example  for  us  being  the 
divine  drama  of  the  Incarnation  or,  more 
picturesquely,  the  conception  of  heaven  and 
hell.  To  those  whose  inner  consciousness  has 
been  dulled  by  the  routine  of  the  world  some 
such  appeal  to  the  imagination  is  no  doubt 
indispensable,  and  it  would  be  well  if  theology 
could  pause  here  and  not  proceed  to  apologetic 
theorising.  Practically  all  the  ruinous  battles 
of  the  Church  have  been  fought  over  the  attempt, 
inevitably  futile  in  the  end,  to  interpret  this 
mythology  in  terms  of  the  reason  and  yet  to 
preserve  it  intact.  Thus  the  contest  with 
Arianism  was  over  the  seeming — rather,  the 
real — unreason  of  the  dual  nature  of  Christ; 
Augustine's  attack  on  Pelagianism  was  for  the 
sake  of  maintaining  the  sharp  division  between 
Grace  and  man's  fallen  will;  Luther's  justifica- 
tion by  faith  argued  a  complete  breach  between 
the  natural  and  the  redeemed  man;  the  war  of 
Jansenism  and  Jesuitism  was  but  a  repetition 
of  the  dispute  between  Augustine  and  Pela- 
gius.  Unfortunately,  the  reason,  when  once 
awakened  to  its  powers,  finds  itself  in  jeop- 
ardy from  its  own  theological  apology,  and,  like 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     21 

another  Cronos,  devours  its  offspring.  Heaven 
and  hell  are  swept  away;  the  religious  sense, 
which  has  become  atrophied  through  dependence 
on  this  myth,  seems  to  fail  altogether,  and  we 
have  the  state  which,  with  various  eddies  of 
revolt,  has  prevailed  since  the  deistic  movement 
of  the  eighteenth  century, — a  blustering  denial 
of  man's  uneasiness  and  an  organised  effort  to 
drown  that  feeling  in  social  sympathy. 

Of  the  endeavour  of  metaphysics  to  recon- 
cile this  dualism  little  need  be  said,  because 
in  its  purest  form  it  contains  an  element  pal- 
pably self-destructive.  Whereas  religion  veils 
the  reality  of  human  experience  in  an  eternal 
allegory,  metaphysics  would .  argue  this  ex- 
perience away.  Religion  would  escape  the 
dilemma  of  dualism  by  sacrificing  one  of  its 
terms;  metaphysics  denies  the  existence  of  one 
or  the  other  term.  Hence  the  endless  logoma- 
chy of  the  two  schools  of  philosophy,  Protean 
in  their  change  of  form,  but  always  radically 
opposed  to  each  other  as  reason  champions 
this  side  or  that.  For  whether  the  resultant 
theory  is  that  of  Pamienides  or  of  Heraclitus, 
whether  it  be  realism  or  nominalism,  the  panthe- 
ism of  Spinoza  or  the  deism  of  Locke,  some 
bubble  of  neo-Hegelianism  or  babble  of  prag- 
matism,— the  process  is  always  the  same:  it  is 
the  reason  denying  one  term  of  our  dual  nature 
and    magnifying  the  other  into  an  hypothesis 


22  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  universal  being.  ^  And  the  answer  is  always 
and  to  either  school  the  same:  the  very  ex- 
istence of  this  irreconcilable  hostility  is  a  proof 
that  facts  of  experience  do  not  coincide  with 
the  demand  of  reason  for  unity. 

When  we  turn  from  religion  and  philosophy 
to  literature  this  dualism  becomes  in  the  nature 
of  the  case  more  obscure ;  yet  to  one  who  looks 
closely  it  will  still  be  found  to  underlie  just  those 
passages  of  the  poets  which  appeal  most  in- 
sistently to  the  deeper  strata  of  our  sensibilities. 
It  may  even  be  used — though  with  extreme 
caution — as  a  test  to  discriminate  the  higher 
from  the  lower  realm  of  artistic  intuition. 
Certainly,  if  one  will  examine  the  celestial 
machinery  of  two  such  epics  as  Paradise  Lost 
and  the  Mneid,  this  difference  will  fairly  strike 
the  eyes.  Read  Milton's  dialogue  in  heaven 
which  follows  the  magnificent  apostrophe  to 
light: 

>  An  excellent  example  of  this  kind  of  argument  may 
be  found  in  Prof.  William  James's  Pluralism  and 
Religion  in  the  Hibbert  Journal  for  July,  1908:  "The 
line  of  least  resistance,  then,  as  it  seems  to  me,  both 
in  theology  and  in  philosophy,  is  to  accept,  along 
with  the  superhuman  consciousness,  the  notion  that 
it  is  not  all-embracing — the  notion,  in  other  words, 
that  there  is  a  God,  but  that  he  is  finite,  either  in 
power  or  knowledge,  or  in  both  at  once."  That 
line  of  least  resistance  is,  really,  just  a  trifle  naive,  when 
you  stop  to  think  of  it. 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     23 

To  whoTTi  the  great  Creator  thus  replied : 
O  Son,  in  whom  my  soul  hath  chief  delight, 
Son  of  my  bosom,  Son  who  art  alone 
My  word,  my  wisdom  and  effectual  might, 
All  hast  thou  spoken  as  my  thoughts  are,  all 
As  my  eternal  purpose  hath  decreed.  .  .  . 

Is  it  not  sufficiently  evident  throughout  these 
passages  that  the  poet's  rationahsm  has  pre- 
vented him  from  distinguishing  between  the 
mystery  of  divinity  and  the  mere  planning  and 
providing  faculties  of  man?  His  deity  is  thus 
neither  completely  anthropomorphic  nor  in- 
finitely supernatural,  and  there  is  something 
repellent  and  illogical  in  the  whole  substratum 
of  the  poem.  Turn  then  to  the  lines  in  the 
beginning  of  the  ^'Eneid  from  which  Milton  bor- 
rowed his  scene: 

Olli  subridens  hominum  sator  atque  deorum 
Voltu,  quo  c^lum  tempestatesque  serenat, 
Oscula  libavit  natae,  dehinc  talia  fatur: 
Farce  metu,  Cytherea,  m.anent  inmota  tuorum 
Fata  tihi:  cernes  urbem  et  promissa  Lavini 
Mcenia,  sublimemque  feres  ad  sidera  caeli 
Magnanimum  ^nean;  neque  me  sententia  vertit. 
Hie  tibi — fabor  enim,  quando  hasc  te  cura  remordet, 
Longius  et  volvens  fatorum  arcana  movebo.  .  .  . 

(The  father  of  men  and  gods,  smiling  upon  his 
daughter  with  that  countenance  beneath  which  sky 
and  weather  grow  serene,  kissed  her  lightly  and  thus 
spoke:  Fear  not,  Cytherea;  unmoved  remain  the  fates 
of  those  thou  lovest.  .  .  .  For,  since  I  behold  thy  anx- 
iety, I  will  speak  at  length  and  unroll  before  thee  the 
secret  things  of  the  fates.) 


24  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

At  first  it  might  appear  that  Virgil,  as  he 
is  here  even  more  frankly  anthropomorphic 
than  Milton,  so  moves  on  a  lower  plane.  But 
look  closer,  and  the  inference  is  turned  quite 
the  other  way  about.  Because  Virgil  recognises 
the  great  cleft  between  the  divine  and  the 
human — or,  if  you  will,  the  divine  and  the 
natural  in  the  human — he  sees  the  futility  of 
trying  to  personify  God  by  segregating  from 
man's  being  one  such  faculty  as  the  reason;  he 
knows  that  the  movers  of  the  world,  the  rerum 
causcB,  cannot  be  defined,  but  only  interpreted 
to  the  imagination  through  symbols  completely 
human  and  finite,  and  his  gods  are  but  men  with 
all  their  passions  on  a  larger  scale.  Far  beyond 
the  gods  and  their  meddling  lie,  dimly  adum- 
brated, the  inmota  fata,  the  secret  things  of 
destiny.  And  this  deeper  intuition  affects 
not  only  the  celestial  machinery  of  the  jEneid, 
but  its  whole  texture  and  language.  With  all 
the  exaltation  of  Milton's  style  it  must  be  ad- 
mitted that  his  work  contains  nothing  corre- 
sponding to  the  Latin  poet's  sudden  glimpses 
into  the  abyss  in  such  lines  as  the  Venit  summa 
dies,  or  the  repeated  Requies  ea  certa  laborum. 
With  all  the  luminous  beauty  spread  over 
Milton's  Paradise,  there  is  nothing  which  quite 
takes  the  place  of  Virgil's  Tacitce  per  arnica 
silentia  lunce,  wherein  the  stillness  of  that  de- 
sired rest,  the  stillness  of  the  unmoved  fates, 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA    25 

seems  almost  to  be  made  visible  in  the  nocturnal 
heavens. 

Nor  need  we  turn  to  these  great  creations  of 
the  imagination  and  reason  to  observe  the  law 
of  dualism.  We  all  of  us  have  felt  the  painful 
paradox  of  mutability;  all  of  us,  looking  upon 
the  world  at  large  and  upon  human  activities, 
have  wavered  between  the  conception  of  end- 
less ungovemed  motion  as  the  only  reality 
and  the  thought  of  some  invisible  power  sit- 
ting motionless  at  the  centre;  and  then,  turn- 
ing within  ourselves,  have  perceived  that  this 
antinomy  is  caused  by,  or  corresponds  to,  a  like 
division  there.  So  we  are  for  ever  driven  on  by 
restlessness;  yet  which  of  us,  now  and  then, 
amid  this  daily  storming  of  desiies  that  run 
after  ephemeral  things,  has  not  said  in  thought, 
as  Michael  Angelo  said  in  fact,  "  Beata  I'alma, 
ove  -non  corre  tempo — happy  the  soul  where  time 
no  longer  courses".'*  And,  piercing  still  further 
into  consciousness,  we  resolve  that  contrast  into 
a  warfare  between  an  impetuous  personal 
self-will  and  that  will  to  refrain  which  is  the 
submission  to  a  deeper  Self. 

Here  is  no  room  for  pantheism,  and  no  word 
is  apt  to  give  a  falser  impression  of  the  early 
Indian  philosophy  than  the  term  "monism" 
which  is  so  glibly  applied  to  it.  For  what  in 
the  end  is  pantheism,  or  religious  monism?  It 
is  either  a  vague  and  lax  state  of  reverie,  or,  if 


26  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

pronounced  as  a  consistent  theory  of  existence, 
an  attempt  to  fuse  together  the  metaphysical  de- 
nial of  one  phase  of  consciousness  with  the  myth- 
ological projection  of  man's  aspiring  spirit  into 
the  void.     It  is  thus  a  barren  hybrid  between 
religion  and  philosophy  with  no  correspondence 
in   our  emotional   or   rational   needs.     To   say 
flatly  that  God  is  all,  and  that  there  is  nothing 
but  God,  is  simply  a  negation  of  what  we  know 
and  feel ;  it  is  the  proton  pseudos  of  metaphysical 
religion.     Now,  it  cannot  be  said  too  often  that 
the  Upanishads  are  essentially  the   groping  of 
many  minds  after  the  truth,  and  not  a  system- 
atised  philosophy.     Consequently,   as  each  as- 
pect of  the  truth  appears,  it  is  magnified  without 
reference  to  what  has   preceded  or  what  may 
follow,  and  each   text  must  be   interpreted  by 
the  drift  and  consensus  of  the  whole.     From 
the  nature  of  this  search  and  from  the  goal  in 
view,  many  passages  might  seem  to  express  the 
crudest  pantheism;  but  always,  if  we  look  more 
attentively,  the  way  leads,  not  into  that  blind 
abyss,  but  quite  otherwhere.      Because  the  end 
to  be  reached  is  so  high  and  great,  it  is  said  to 
contain  within  itself  all  lesser  things:  "He  who 
has    seen,    heard,    comprehended,    and    known 
the  Self,  by  him  is  this  whole  world  known." 
And  a  stanza  in  the  same  Upanishad  begins: 

This  shall  a  man  know  in  his  mind, 
That  nothing  here  is  manifold. 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     27 

Pantheism  and  monism  could  not  apparently  be 
stated  more  explicitly ;  and  yet  in  fact  nothing 
is  further  from  the  writer's  thought  than  a 
theory  which  would  deny  the  dualism  of  hu- 
man experience.  The  conclusion  of  the  stanza 
points  to  the  correct  interpretation: 

From  death  to  death  he  ever  goes, 
Who  sees  the  world  as  manifold. 

The  intention  is  not  to  deny  the  independence 
of  phenomenal  existence,  but  to  withdraw  the 
mind  from  dwelling  therein;  to  contrast  in  the 
strongest  terms  the  worldly  and  the  spiritual 
life,  the  lower  and  the  higher  path:  "Out  of 
the  unreal  lead  me  to  the  real ;  Out  of  dark- 
ness lead  me  to  light ;  Out  of  death  lead  me  to 
deathlessness." 

But  if  the  lesson  of  the  Upanishads  is  incom- 
patible with  that  false  hybrid  between  religion 
and  philosophy,  it  is  still  further  removed  from 
a  mechanical  balancing  of  soul  and  body, 
spirit  and  matter,  such  as  was  later  taught  by 
the  Sankhyan  philosophy,  or  by  the  Manichaeism, 
which,  in  somewhat  attenuated  form,  was  in- 
filtered  into  Christianity  through  Saint  Augus- 
tine. Rather  this  effort  to  pass  from  the  un- 
real to  the  real  takes  the  form  of  a  progressive 
contemplation  of  the  world  and  of  man  him- 
self from  an  ever  higher  point  of  view.  The 
rumor  was  spread  abroad  that  certain  of  these 


28  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

eremites  of  the  forest  had  discovered  the  secret 
of  the  world  and  of  man,  and  the  names  of 
Brahma  and  Atman  ran  from  mouth  to  mouth. 
What  is  the  meaning  of  these  mystic  formulae? 
Who  has  heard  and  can  impart  the  truth  ?  The 
answer  comes  almost  always  in  a  dialogue  which 
carries  the  mind  of  the  inquirer  upward  step 
by  step,  ending  often,  like  the  dialectic  of 
Plato,  in  a  parable: 

Gargya,  the  son  of  Balika,  was  a  Brahman,  proud 
of  his  learning.  Said  he  to  Ajatafatru,  the  King  of 
Kaci,  "Shall  I  tell  you  about  Brahma?"— "For  such 
a  lesson,"  replied  Aj^tajatru,  "  I  would  pay  a  thousand 
cows. "... 

Gargya  said,  "The  person  in  the  sun,  him  I  adore 
as  Brahma."  Ajitagatru  said,  "Speak  not  to  me 
of  him!  I  adore  him  already  as  the  supreme,  the  head 
of  all  beings,  the  king." — Verily,  whoever  adores  him 
thus,  becomes  supreme,  the  head  of  all  beings,  the 
king. 

Gargya  said,  "The  person  in  the  moon,  him  I  adore 
as  Brahma."  Ajata^atru  said,  "Speak  not  to  me  of 
him!  I  adore  him  already  as  the  great  one  clad  in  white 
raiment,  as  King  Soma"  [the  sacrificial  juice,  sacred  to 
the  moon]. — Verily,  whoever  adores  him  thus,  Soma 
is  poured  out  and  poured  forth  for  him  day  by  day, 
and  his  food  does  not  fail. 

Gargya  said,  "The  person  in  the  lightning,  him  I 
adore  as  Brahma."  Ajatajatru  said,  "  Speak  not  to 
me  of  him!  I  adore  him  already  as  the  luminous." — 
Verily,  whoever  adores  him  thus,  becomes  luminous, 
and  his  children  after  him  become  luminous. 

So  the  argument  progresses,  haltingly  indeed, 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF   INDIA     29 

through  the  conception  of  Brahma  (the  spirit 
of  the  outer  world)  as  ether,  space,  the  reflection 
in  a  mirror,  life,  even  death;  until  in  the  end 
all  the  arrows  of  the  boastful  Gargya  are  shot 
and  he  is  reduced  to  silence.  "Then  said 
Ajatagatru,  '  Thus  far  only  ? '— '  Thus  far  only,' 
he  replied. — '  This  does  not  suffice  to  know  it,' 
said  Ajatagatru.— '  Nay,  let  me  come  to  thee 
as  learner,'  said  Gargya  —  And  Ajatajatru 
answered,  *  It  is  unnatural  that  a  Brahman 
should  come  to  a  Kshatriyan  to  learn  about 
Brahma;  yet  will  I  teach  thee.'  So  saying 
he  took  him  by  the  hand  and  arose.  And  the 
two  came  to  a  man  who  was  asleep." 

The  process  when  applied  to  the  inner  nature 
of  man  is  much  the  same,  and  the  result  not 
different.  Yajnavalkya  we  have  seen  preparing 
to  go  out  into  the  woods,  and  discussing  with 
his  wife  the  incomparable  value  of  self-know- 
ledge above  all  worldly  possessions.  He  is 
indeed  one  of  the  fabulous  possessors  of  the  se- 
cret, to  whom  many  travelled  for  enlightenment, 
and  from  whom  some  departed  as  wise  as  they 
came.  One  too  inquisitive  woman,  who  pressed 
him  with  question  after  question,  until  only 
the  final  revelation  remained,  he  silenced 
abruptly:  "Do  not  ask  too  much,  or  your 
head  will  burst!"  Another  inquirer,  Janaka, 
King  of  the  Videhas,  he  would  have  put 
off,    had    he   not    been    bound    by    a   former 


30  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

promise.     And  so  Janaka  questions  him  about 
the  secret: 

" Yajnavalkya,"  he  said,  "what  is  the  light  of 
man?"— "The  sun,  O  King,"  he  repUed;  "for  by  the 
Hght  of  the  sun  he  sits  and  moves  about,  does  his  work 
and  returns." — "So  it  is,  O  Yajnavalkya." 

"But  when  the  sun  has  set,  O  Yajnavalkya,  what 
is  then  the  light  of  man?" — "The  moon  is  then  his 
Hght;  for  by  the  light  of  the  moon  he  sits  and  moves 
about,  does  his  work  and  returns." — "So  it  is,  O 
Yajnavalkya." 

"But,  O  Yajnavalkya,  when  the  sun  has  set,  and 
the  moon  has  set,  what  is  the  light  of  man?" — "Fire 
is  then  his  light;  for  by  the  light  of  fire  he  sits  and 
moves  about,  does  his  work  and  returns." — "So  it  is,  O 
Yajnavalkya. " 

"But,  O  Y4jnavalkya,  when  the  sun  has  set,  and 
the  moon  has  set,  and  the  fire  has  gone  out,  what  is 
then  the  light  of  man?" — "Speech  is  then  his  light; 
for  by  the  light  of  speech  he  sits  and  moves  about, 
does  his  work  and  returns.  Therefore,  O  King,  when 
one  cannot  see  one's  own  hand,  yet  when  a  voice  is 
heard,  one  goes  toward  it." — "  So  it  is,  O  Yajnavalkya." 

"But,  O  Yajnavalkya,  when  the  sun  has  set,  and 
the  moon  has  set,  and  the  fire  has  gone  out,  and  no 
speech  is  heard,  what  is  then  the  light  of  man? " — "The 
Self  [Atman]  is  then  his  light;  for  by  the  light  of 
the  Self  he  sits  and  moves  about,  does  his  work  and 
returns." 

"What  is  this  Self?" 

One  feels  almost  as  if  an  apology  were  de- 
manded for  offering  such  naive  dialogues  as 
examples   of    a   world-famed   philosophy;    and 


THE    FOREST   PHILOSOPHY    OF   INDIA   3 1 

indeed,  only  after  long  reading  of  these  sacred 
books,  when  the  grotesque  and  infantile  imag- 
ery has  lost  its  strangeness  to  us,  do  we 
begin  to  feel  the  uplift  in  this  endless  seeking 
after  the  truth,  the  sense  of  expansion  and 
freedom  as  the  mind  is  carried  again  and  again 
toward  that  goal  of  the  infinite  Brahma  and 
the  infinite  Self.  The  excitement  is  never 
quite  lost  in  this  pursuit,  the  surprise  never 
quite  dulled  when  suddenly,  in  the  end,  comes 
the  revelation  that  the  infinite  we  grope  after 
in  the  world  without  and  within  is  one  and  the 
same,  that  Brahma  and  Atman  are  identical. 
"In  the  highest  golden  sheath  there  is  the 
Brahma,  without  passions  and  without  parts. 
That  is  pure,  that  is  the  light  of  lights,  that  is 
it  which  they  know  who  know  the  Self  (Atman) . 
The  sun  does  not  shine  there,  nor  the  moon  and 
the  stars,  nor  these  lightnings,  nor  yet  this 
earthly  fire."  It  would  be  hard  to  exaggerate 
the  importance  of  this  discovery,  made  so  many 
years  ago  in  the  forest  of  India,  that  the  eternal 
and  infinite  expectation  of  the  soul  is  not  to  be 
sought  in  submission  to  an  incomprehensible  and 
inhuman  force  impelling  the  world,  nor  yet  in 
obedience  to  a  personal  God,  but  is  already 
within  us  awaiting  revelation,  is  in  fact  our 
very  Self  of  Self.  The  thought,  as  it  comes 
down  to  us  from  those  ancient  sages,  may 
sound  strange  to  our  ears,  yet  at  bottom  it  is 


32  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

only  what  in  a  small  way  we  each  of  us  feel 
and  know  as  the  refuge  from  the  vexations  of 
daily  life.  Nay,  it  increases  with  the  magni- 
tude of  our  actions,  teaching  us  that  there  is 
that  within  which  has  no  part  in  our  individual 
hopes  and  fears  and  is  unconcerned  in  the 
meaningless  medley  of  fortune.  It  is  the  calm 
of  the  victorious  general  as  he  directs  the  storm 
of  battle: 

'T  was  then  great  Marlbro's  mighty  soul  was  proved, 
That,  in  the  shock  of  changing  hosts  unmoved. 
Amidst  confusion,  horror,   and   despair, 
Examin'd  all  the  dreadful  scenes  of  war; 
In  peaceful  thought  the  field  of  death  survey'd. 

It  guides  the  patriot  to  self-surrender,  and 
above  all  it  is  the  rapture  of  the  martyr  who  in 
death  finds  his  higher  life.  The  gist  of  the 
matter  is  in  the  words  of  Christ,  or  of  that 
author  of  Christian  mysticism,  who  said,  "I 
and  my  father  are  one."  "And,"  as  Sir 
Thomas  Browne  wrote  in  his  grandiloquent 
manner,  "if  any  have  been  so  happy  as  truly 
to  understand  Christian  annihilation,  ecsta- 
sies, exsolution,  liquefaction,  transformation,  the 
kiss  of  the  spouse,  gustation  of  God,  and  in- 
gression  into  the  divine  shadow,  they  have  al- 
ready had  an  handsome  anticipation  of  heaven ; 
the  glory  of  the  world  is  surely  over,  and  the 
earth  in  ashes  unto  them." 

But,    whereas    in    Christianity    this    present 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     33 

and  entire  identification  of  the  human  soul 
with  God  is  sporadic  and  never  quite  free  of 
theological  colouring,  in  India  it  is  constant 
and  absolute.  Tat  tvam  asi,  that  art  thou,  is 
the  formula  in  which  it  is  summed  up  and 
reiterated  without  end. — "That  subtle  spirit  at 
the  heart  of  all  this  world,  that  is  the  reality, 
that  is  the  Self,  that  art  thou."  And  the  imag- 
ination of  these  early  philosophers  exhausts 
itself  in  the  effort  to  figure  this  mystic  Brahma, 
or  Atman,  in  the  terms  of  finite  language.  We 
have  seen  how  Ajatagatru,  to  explain  the  na- 
ture of  Brahma,  at  last  leads  his  interlocutor 
to  a  man  who  was  asleep ;  and  in  the  same  way 
Yajnavalkya,  when  pressed  by  Janaka  to  de- 
fine the  Self,  can  only  point  to  the  state  of  deep 
sleep  in  which  the  spirit  of  man  transcends  this 
world  and  all  the  forms  of  death.  In  another 
Upanishad  the  great  Indra  comes  again  and 
again  to  Prajapati  as  a  pupil  to  learn  the  nature 
of  this  Self  which  even  to  the  gods  is  a  mystery. 
At  last  the  teacher  says : 

"When  a  man  is  in  deep  sleep  and  at  perfect  rest, 
so  that  he  dreams  not,  that  is  the  Self,  the  deathless, 
the  fearless,  that  is  Brahma.  " — Then  Indra  went  away- 
satisfied  in  his  heart.  But  before  he  had  got  back 
to  the  gods,  this  difficulty  occurred  to  him:  "Alas,  a 
man  in  that  state  has  no  knowledge  of  himself;  he 
knows  not  that  I  am  I,  nor  does  he  know  anything 
that  exists.  He  is  gone  to  utter  annihilation.  I  see 
no  profit  therein." 

3 


34  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

So  with  fuel  in  his  hand  [the  regular  fee  to  a  teacher] 
he  came  once  more  as  a  pupil.  And  Prajapati  said 
to  him,"0  Indra,  you  went  away  satisfied  in  your 
heart;  why  now  do  you  come  back?" — "Sir,"  he 
replied,  "in  that  state  a  man  has  no  knowledge  of 
himself;  he  knows  not  that  I  am  I,  nor  does  he  know 
anything  that  exists.  He  is  gone  to  utter  annihila- 
tion.    I  see  no  profit  therein." 

"So  it  is,  Indra,"  said  Prajapati;  "now,  I  will  ex- 
plain the  Self  to  you  further,  but  only  through  this 
same  state.     Live  with  me  other  five  years." 

What  puzzled  Indra  may  well  give  a  Western 
reader  pause,  and,  in  sooth,  Prajapati  does  not 
help  matters  in  his  further  elucidation.  We 
know  the  stages  by  which  the  mind  is  brought 
to  the  brink  of  this  truth,  but  at  the  last  there 
remains  the  great  inevitable  leap  from  reason 
to  unreason.  Spinoza,  the  typical  philosopher, 
sought  to  bridge  that  chasm  by  conceiving 
from  any  finite  effect  an  infinite  series  of  finite 
causes  back  to  the  infinite  cause.  But  that  is 
merely  to  throw  dust  in  the  eyes;  prolong  the 
series  as  you  will,  at  the  last  comes  the  una- 
voidable break.  And  the  Hindus  recognised 
fully  this  impossibility  of  defining  the  infinite 
in  logical  terms.  "He,  the  Self,"  cries  Yajna- 
valkya  at  the  close  of  one  of  his  discussions 
with  Janaka,  "He,  the  Self,  can  only  be  ex- 
pressed by  no,  no !  He  is  incomprehensible, 
for  he  cannot  be  comprehended;  undecaying, 
for  he  cannot  decay;  unattached,  for  he  does 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     35 

not  attach  himself;  he  is  unfettered,  untroubled, 
unhurt."  And  then,  passing  from  the  insuf- 
ficiency of  metaphysical  theory  to  the  reality 
of  religious  experience,  the  teacher  adds,  "And 
thou,  O  Janaka,  hast  attained  unto  peace!" 
We  are  constantly  in  danger  of  being  misled 
by  the  later  use  of  the  term  jndna  (gnosis, 
knowledge)  to  express  this  attainment  of 
spiritual  emancipation.  "Knowledge"  may  be 
a  propasdeutic  thereto,  but  "knowledge"  in 
any  ordinary  sense  of  the  word  the  last  stage 
certainly  is  not;  for  how,  as  the  books  them- 
selves say,  can  the  infinite  Knower  himself  be 
known  ?  The  first  step  toward  a  proper  under- 
standing of  the  Hindu  forest  philosophy  must 
be  a  tearing  down  of  the  whole  scaffolding  of 
German  intellectualism.  Hume,  though  for  an 
end  of  his  own,  struck  at  the  heart  of  the  mat- 
ter when  he  wrote,  "What  peculiar  privilege 
has  this  little  agitation  of  the  brain,  which  we 
call  thought,  that  we  must  thus  make  it  the 
model  of  the  universe?" 

And  none  the  less  must  we  be  on  guard  against 
the  Gejilhlsphilosophie,  the  feeling-philosophy, 
which  forms  the  Romantic  complement  to 
German  metaphysics.  Nothing  could  be  farther 
from  the  virile  faith  of  the  ancient  Hindus 
than  that  vague  emotionalism,  freed  from  all 
reason  and  morality,  of  Schleiermacher's  relig- 
ion, which  "as  a  holy  music  should  accompany 


36  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

all  the  actions  of  a  man. "  How  that  heilige 
Musik  sang  in  Schleiermacher's  own  life  may 
be  gathered  from  his  complaisance  over  the 
imbecile  indecencies  of  his  friend  Friedrich 
Schlegel's  Lucinde.  What  it  meant  to  Goethe 
may  be  read  in  that  scene  where  Faust  makes 
his  confession  of  pantheism  to  Gretchen:  "Fill 
thy  heart  with  this  mystery,  however  great 
it  be ;  and  when  thou  art  wholly  blessed  in  the 
feeling,  call  it  then  what  thou  wilt,  name  it 
Fortune,  Heart,  Love,  God!  I  have  no  name 
therefor!  Feeling  is  all  {Gefuhl  ist  A  lies)."  And 
that  feeling?  But  turn  the  page  and  Faust  is 
discovered  employing  it  for  the  seduction  of  a 
simple,  trusting  girl.  ^ 

» It  may  seem  that  unnecessary  weight  is  laid  on  this 
contrast  between  the  Upanishads  and  metaphysical 
Romanticism.  But  two  things  must  be  remembered. 
In  the  first  place  our  own  "higher"  religion  to-day, 
whether  we  call  it  Ritschlianism  or  what  not,  comes 
to  us  in  direct  descent  from  Fichte,  Schelling,  Schleier- 
macher,  and  the  other  Romanticists  of  Germany  who 
dissolved  the  philosophy  of  J.  J.  Rousseau  into  a 
cloud  of  mystifying  words.  And  in  the  second  place 
our  conception  of  ancient  India,  as  an  element  of 
universal  culture,  comes  to  us  from  the  same  source. 
When  we  read  in  Novalis  the  oft-quoted  sentence: 
"Nach  Innen  geht  der  gcheimnissvoUe  Weg;  in  uns 
oder  nirgends  ist  die  Ewigkeit  mit  ihren  Welten,  die 
Vergangenheit  und  Zukunf t " ;  when  we  read  his 
mystical  couplet: 

"Einem  gelang  es, — er  hob   den   Schleier   der  Gottin 
von  Sais, 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     37 

No,  the  faith  of  the  Vedanta  is  neither  intel- 
lectualism  nor  emotionalism;  it  springs  neither 
from  the  libido  sciendi  nor  from  the  libido 
sentiendi.  The  temptation  that  came  to  the 
forest  hermits,  strange  as  it  may  sound,  was 
rather  the  lust  of  power.  It  was  a  fixed  belief 
among   them    that   through    severe    and   long- 

Aber   was   sah   er? — er   sah — Wunder   des   Wunders! 
sich  selbst ;  " — 

it  might  seem  as  if  the  wisdom  of  Yajnavalkya  were 
to  be  caught  from  the  lips  of  a  modern  poet.  Alas, 
nothing  is  inore  deceptive  than  the  human  heart, 
nothing  more  elusive  than  these  high  words  of  mysti- 
cism! One  needs  but  a  little  acquaintance  with  the 
lives  and  writings  of  the  Schlegels,  et  id  genus  omne, 
to  know  how  far  apart  India  and  modern  Europe  lie. 
The  transcendental  Ich  of  Fichte  and  the  Fichtians 
turns  out  in  practice  to  be  not  the  Atman  at  all,  but 
a  mere  mummery  of  what  we  know  as  egotism,  an 
unwholesome  exaggeration  of  the  desiring  and  suffering 
personality — 

"  Dine  hunc  ardorem  mentibus  addunt, 
Euryale,  an  sua  cuique  deus  fit  dira  cupido? " 

In  a  word  the  whole  aim  of  Romanticism  was  to  mag- 
nify the  sense  of  individuality  to  a  state  of  morbid 
excess,  wherein  the  finite  and  infinite  should  be  dis- 
solved together  in  formless  reverie;  "Erkennen  und 
Begehren  soil  nicht  zwei  in  mir  sein,  sondern  Eins, " 
said  Schleiermacher,  and  this  union  was  to  be  found 
in  emotional  self-contemplation.  The  Veddnta  sought 
through  the  discipline  of  knowledge  and  self-restraint 
to  put  away  these  purely  individual  desires  and  eino- 
tions  altogether,  and  so  to  distinguish  between  the  two 


38  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

continued  asceticism  a  man  by  aquiring  mas- 
tery over  himself  might  attain  to  supernatural 
ascendency  over  the  world  and  the  gods;  and 
the  stories  of  these  wilful  saints  form  the  dark 
side  to  Indian  legendary  life.  Even  Ravana, 
the  personification  of  evil  in  the  Epic  Rdmdyana, 
had  raised  himself  to  his  terrible  pre-eminence 
by  austerities.  But,  normally,  the  forest  life 
was  only  the  last  stage  of  a  discipline  that  was 
begun  with  the  Brahman's  birth ;  and  the 
practice  of  asceticism,  if  indulged  in  at  all,  was 
for  the  confirming  within  him  of  that  will  to 
refrain  by  which,  and  by  which  alone,  a  man 
may  acquire  dominion  over  himself,  subduing 
the  lower  to  the  higher  nature.  Again  and 
again  it  is  said  that  only  he  who  is  tranquil, 
self -restrained,  self-denying,  patient,  and  col- 
lected, can  enter  into  the  possession  of  Brahma; 
and  all  this  is  the  discipline  of  tapas,  by  which 
the  obstructions  on  the  path  are  burned  away. 
We  know  that  path,  and  the  guides  of  knowledge 

selves.  The  disentangling  of  the  genuine  Vedanta 
from  its  Romantic  associations  is  thus  as  imperative 
as  it  is  difficult.  Deussen,  a  professed  disciple  of 
Schopenhauer,  has  not  lightened  the  task.  And  it 
must  be  confessed  that  the  publications  of  modern 
Hindus  in  the  Vedanta  Society  and  elsewhere  only 
increase  the  confusion.  We  hear  the  old  words,  but 
they  have  acquired  a  new  emotional  colouring.  India, 
also,  in  more  recent  years  has  passed  through  its 
period  of  Romanticism. 


THE  FOREST  PHILOSOPHY  OF  INDIA     39 

and  self-control  that  conduct  us  on  our  way, 
but  who  shall  name  to  us  the  last  step  ? — 

The  Self  is  not  found  out  by  study,  nor  by  the 
understanding,  nor  by  much  learning.  To  whomso- 
ever it  listeth,  the  Self  become th  manifest,  and  to  him 
it  belongeth. 

To  whomsoever  it  listeth.  If  we  wish  to  find 
any  parallel  in  the  Western  world  for  this  last 
mystery  of  faith,  we  must  go  back  to  Saint 
Augustine's  theory  of  Free  Grace  or  to  the 
attempt  of  Jansenius  to  restore  that  hard 
doctrine.  The  discipline  and  preparation  for 
the  divine  gift  were  pretty  much  the  same  for 
Brahman  and  for  Christian:  to  both  salvation 
came  in  the  end  as  an  ineffable  transition  or 
transformation  in  which  his  natural  human 
faculties  took  no  part.  Only  there  was  this 
profound  difference:  in  the  Christian  this 
change  was  effected  by  the  beneficence  of  an 
enthroned  Person,  who  rapt  him  as  it  were  out 
of  himself ;  whereas  the  Hindu,  strictly  speaking^ 
knew  no  God,  and  needed  no  mythology;  eman- 
cipation came  to  him  when  the  illusion  of  his 
lower  self  fell  away  and  left  him  to  his  true 
Self,  alone  with  that  alone.  Brahma  and  At- 
man  were  one. 

Thus  the  dualism  of  the  Vedanta  was  in  the 
man  himself;  discipline  and  preparation  there 
might  be,  but  in  the  end  it  perceived  an  irrecon- 


40  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

cilable  gulf  fixed  between  the  infinite  Self  and 
the  finite  personality.  And  as  the  mind  dwelt 
on  one  of  these  terms,  the  other  lost  in  compari- 
son its  present  reality;  the  world  fell  apart 
into  the  real  and  the  unreal,  the  true  and  the 
false,  the  blissful  and  the  sorrowful,  the  known 
and  the  unknown.  Hence  arose  that  doctrine 
of  May^,  illusion,  as  applied  to  the  whole  realm 
of  phenomenal  existence,  which  has  led  many 
to  read  in  the  Upanishads  a  philosophy  of 
monistic  pantheism.  The  true  interpretation 
involves  the  subtlest  and  least  understood 
process  of  Oriental  thought.  There  was  not 
for  the  Hindu  (as  there  has  never  been  for 
human  intelligence)  any  means  by  which  the 
reason  could  pass  from  the  finite  to  the  infinite 
and  explain  one  in  terms  of  the  other.  Our 
attitude  toward  the  rational  connection  of 
these  two  must  always  be  one  of  confessed 
ignorance.  We  know  that  both  claim  a  place 
in  our  experience,  while  at  the  same  time  our 
understanding  denies  the  possibility  of  their 
coexistence.  Therefore,  if  one  of  these  states  of 
consciousness  is  accepted  as  a  reality  by  the 
understanding,  is,  so  to  speak,  known,  the  other 
must  at  that  time  be  an  unreality,  must  be 
unknown.  As  we  face  in  one  direction,  we  must 
turn  our  back  on  the  other.  Thus  the  very 
endeavour  of  the  forest  philosopher  to  realise 
the    higher   Self   within   him    meant    that    his 


THE    FOREST    PHILOSOPHY    OF  INDIA   41 

lower  self  and  its  home  in  the  phenomenal 
world  became  an  unreality  to  the  understand- 
ing. He  transferred  our  ignorance  of  the 
relation  between  the  infinite  and  the  finite  to 
the  finite  itself.  For  him  the  world  existed 
thus  only  through  ignorance,  and  by  a  metaphor 
of  language  ignorance  was  the  cause  of  the 
world's  existence.  As  he  attained  knowledge 
by  putting  away  ignorance  the  world  ceased 
for  him  to  exist.  Such  is  the  nature  of  the 
doctrine  of  vidyd  (knowledge)  and  avidyd 
(non-knowledge)  which  formed  the  basis  of 
Hindu  philosophy.  It  differs  from  Western 
metaphysics  in  its  frank  acceptance  of  the  dual- 
ism of  human  experience  and  of  man's  inability 
to  reconcile  that  dualism  through  the  reason. 

In  after  times  the  sense  of  this  dualism  weighed 
on  the  Hindu  mind  like  the  oppression  of  a 
frightful  nightmare,  and  we  not  seldom  find 
him  sinking  into  a  state  of  pessimism  similar  to 
that  which  Schopenhauer  portrayed  to  Europe 
as  the  essence  of  the  Upanishads.  He  could  not 
throw  off  the  weariness  of  ceaseless  change  and 
of  unresting  desires ;  he  was  haunted  with  a  vision 
of  the  soul  passing  through  innumerable  exist- 
ences, forever  whirled  about  with  the  wheel 
of  mutation,  forever  seeking  and  never  finding 
peace ;  and  from  that  weltering  sea  he  reached 
out  toward  salvation  with  a  kind  of  pathetic 
despair; 


42  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

O  World  !  I  faint  in  this  thy  multitude 
Of  little  things  and  their  relentless  feud; 
No  meaning  have  I  found  through  all  my  days 
In  their  fantastic  maze. 

O  World!  still  through  the  hours  of  blissful  night 
The  widowed  moon  her  benison  of  light 
Outpoureth,  where  the  sacred  river  seems 
From  heaven  to  bear  sweet  dreams. 

How  soon,  O  World,  beside  the  Gangi  shore, 
Through  the  long  silent  night  shall  I  implore 
The  mystic  name?  how  soon  in  Gangi's  wave 
My  sin-stained  body  lave  ?  > 

But  in  the  books  of  the  older  philosophers 
there  is  little  of  this  morbid  yearning,  no  touch 
of  fierce  pessimism;  and  their  fault  is  rather 
an  inhuman  disregard  for  the  disabilities  of 
our  mortal  state.  Indeed,  the  illusion  and  mu- 
tability of  life  are  seldom  mentioned,  however 
they  may  lie  as  a  background  to  the  brighter 
picture.  The  substance  of  those  books  is  the 
great  and  indomitable  zest  of  a  strong  people 
groping  for  the  light;  and  through  the  seeking 
and  the  questioning  there  breaks  now  and  then 
the  supreme  joy  of  one  who  has  found  and 
knows  what  he  has  found.  "Brahma  is  joy 
and  knowledge,"  said  the  teacher  whose  name 
we  have  met  most  frequently  in  this  excursion 
into  the  forests  of  India. 

'  Here,  and  in  one  or  two  other  places  further  on,  I 
quote  the  translation  of  Bhartrihari  from  my  Century 
of  Indian  Epigrams. 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA 

In  the  course  of  time  every  religion  is  brought 
face  to  face  with  a  problem  which  it  must  solve 
or  cease  to  grow,  which — and  this  is  the  tragic 
recurrence  of  history — it  can  solve  only  by 
surrendering  its  purest  portion  of  truth.  The 
religious  instinct,  as  we  have  seen,  is  based  on 
the  two  contrary  tendencies  in  the  soul  of  man, 
by  one  of  which  he  is  dragged  down  to  the 
desires  and  painful  satisfactions  of  this  world, 
while  by  the  other  he  is  lifted  out  of  changing 
impressions  into  the  serene  contemplative  pos- 
session of  himself.  Faith  is  the  faculty  where- ' 
by  the  world  becomes  unreal  beneath  the  light 
of  the  greater  inner  reality.  In  the  days  of 
fair  beginning,  when  the  few  elect  minds  are 
making  their  way  up  the  delightful  stairs  of 
truth  and  the  end  is  felt  as  a  wonderful  possi- 
bility, the  difficulty  of  the  final  paradox  is  only 
a  goad  to  progress.  But  when  all  is  defined 
and  settled  and  there  is  no  longer  the  liberty 
of  an  imagined  hope,  then  too  often  comes  the 
benumbing  disappointment.  Religion,  we  are 
told,  should  carry  us  into  a  sphere  where  the 

43 


44  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

claims  of  this  world  have  no  meaning  to  the 
soul,  yet  withal  we  are  men  among  men,  with 
imperious  needs  and  duties;  and  we  see  not 
who  shall  reconcile  the  aspirations  of  faith 
with  the  demands  of  daily  existence.  And 
so  it  is  the  history  of  Christianity,  as  of  every 
new  gospel,  that  as  it  expands  and  defines 
itself,  it  must  alter  from  a  free  and  noble  in- 
spiration of  faith  to  a  Church  organised  for 
the  guidance  and  regulating  of  society. 

Nor  is  this  antinomy  of  hope  and  fact  confined 
to  the  larger  historic  movement;  in  a  smaller 
way  it  is  repeated  in  the  growth  of  each  indi- 
vidual who  knows  clearly  what  he  is  and  what 
he  aspires  to  be.  If  indeed  religion  is  a  denial 
of  the  earthly  state,  there  should  seem  to  be 
no  satisfaction  of  its  claims  save  in  that  stern 
renunciation  of  the  Brahman  in  his  last  stage, 
who,  leaving  all  things  behind  him,  walked 
steadfastly  on  until  death  brought  its  release 
and  consummation.  Rather,  who  shall  say  that 
the  death  of  the  body  is  the  final  answer,  and 
that  the  trial  is  not  to  be  renewed  and  the  agony 
of  division  repeated  here  or  elsewhere? — 

And  we  shall  be  unsatisfied  as  now; 

And  we  shall  feel  the  agony  of  thirst, 

The  ineffable  longing  for  the  life  of  life 

Baffled  for  ever;  and  still  thought  and  mind 

Will  hurry  us  with  them  on  their  homeless  march, 

Over  the  unallied  unopening  earth, 

Over  the  unrecognising  sea;  while  air 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  45 

Will  blow  us  fiercely  back  to  sea  and  earth, 

And  fire  repel  us  from  its  living  waves. 

And  then  we  shall  unwillingly  return 

Back  to  this  meadow  of  calamity, 

This  uncongenial  place,  this  human  life; 

And  in  our  individual  human  state 

Go  through  the  sad  probation  all  again, 

To  see  if  we  will  poise  our  life  at  last. 

To  see  if  we  will  now  at  last  be  true 

To  our  own  only  true,  deep-buried  selves. 

Being  one  with  which  we  are  one  with  the  whole  world; 

Or  whether  we  will  once  more  fall  away 

Into  some  bondage  of  the  flesh  or  mind. 

Some  slough  of  sense,  or  some  fantastic  maze 

Forged  by  the  imperious  lonely  thinking-power. 

The  lines  are  inspired  by  the  story  and  the 
poetical  fragments  of  the  Greek  Empedocles, 
but  in  them  Matthew  Arnold  has  unconsciously 
come  very  close  to  expressing  the  ancient  prob- 
lem of  religion  as  it  was  seen  by  the  Hindus. 

To  most  men  the  question  comes  in  a  lower 
key,  and  the  very  harshness  of  so  absolute  an 
antinomy  between  religion  and  practice  might 
to  them  indicate  some  error  in  the  absolute 
premises  of  faith.  We  commonly  pass  from 
worship  to  the  world  as  sabbath  dawns  into 
week-day,  and  think  we  have  paid  the  demands 
of  both  God  and  Mammon.  Yet  to  all  of  us, 
even  with  our  gleams  of  faith  obscured  and 
our  natural  instincts  subdued  by  sullen  routine, 
there  must  occur  moments  of  sad  doubting. 
It  is  not  merely  that  we  repine  at  disregarding 


46  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  inner  voice  when  at  intervals  it  makes 
itself  heard,  but  that,  vaguely  it  may  be,  we 
feel  the  honest  difficulty  of  reconciling  its  hum- 
blest demands  with  the  plain  dictates  of  society. 
No  man  who  carries  in  his  heart  a  spark  of 
religion  can  pass  through  the  world  without 
knowing  the  stress  of  this  problem,  and  as 
faith  strengthens  so  his  perplexity  increases. 
Over  and  over  again  this  has  resulted  in  a 
perillous  indifference  to  morality,  and  many  a 
sect  of  the  so-called  Higher  Life  has  ended  in 
the  sanction  of  general  license.  To  the  Hindus 
of  a  later  day  the  question  occurred  with 
a  peculiar  pertinacity.  Philosophically  they 
might  find  an  answer  in  their  theory  of  know- 
ledge and  ignorance.  As  they  saw  no  rational 
connection  between  the  infinite  and  the  finite, 
between  the  sphere  of  faith  and  the  sphere  of 
action,  so  this  connection  ceased  for  them  to 
exist  with  a  full  realisation  of  their  ignorance 
(avidyd).  Knowledge  (vidyd)  was  the  spiritual 
freedom  resulting  from  this  severed  connection. 
Yet  withal  some  formula  must  be  discovered 
which  should,  if  only  by  a  compromise,  reconcile 
these  two  spheres  for  daily  conduct,  and  that 
reconciliation  is  the  main  theme  of  the  Bhagavad 
Gita,  the  Teaching  of  the  Exalted  One,  which 
to  this  day  is  the  real  Bible  of  the  Brahmans. 
The  Gita  has  been  translated  many  times 
into  English  and  other  European  tongues,  and 


THE  BHAGAVAD  g!ta  47 

has  been  the  subject  of  innumerable  commen- 
taries; yet  a  word  as  to  its  place  may  not  be 
superfluous.  It  forms  in  the  original  a  canto 
of  the  Maha  Bharata,  an  enormous,  unwieldy 
epic  in  which  poems  of  many  characters  and  ages 
have  been  strung  together  on  the  thread  of  a  sim- 
ple historic  event.  Briefly,  the  plot  of  the  epic 
is  the  contest  of  two  sets  of  cousins  for  the 
kingdom  of  Hastinapura.  On  the  one  side 
are  the  Kauravas  or  Dhritarashtrans,  of  whom 
Duryodhana  is  the  chief  and  who  claim  the 
throne  as  the  older  branch  of  the  family; 
on  the  other  are  the  Pandavas  (Yudishthira, 
Bhima,  Arjuna,  Nakula,  and  Sahadeva,  with 
their  common  wife  Draupadi),  to  whose  father 
the  succession  had  been  made  over  by  his  older 
brother  on  account  of  blindness,  and  who  are 
regarded  throughout  as  the  rightful  heirs. 
After  many  adventures  the  armies  of  the  two 
factions  meet  on  the  sacred  plain  of  the  Kurus 
to  decide  the  issue  in  battle.  At  this  point 
the  Bhagavad  Gita  is  interpolated.  Arjuna, 
the  hero  of  the  episode,  beholds  the  hosts  drawn 
up  in  battle  array,  and  is  smitten  with  compunc- 
tion at  the  thought  of  all  those  who  shall  perish 
on  the  field.  He  commands  his  charioteer, 
who  is  no  other  than  an  incarnation  of  the  god 
Krishna,  to  stay  his  car  on  the  "bridge  of  war, " 
and  there  gives  vent  to  his  doubts:^ 

» The  Bhagavad  Git4  is  divided  into  eighteen  books 


48  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

I.     13. 

Thereupon  conchs  and  kettledrums,  cymbals,  tabors, 

and  trumpets 
Of  a  sudden  were  sounded  forth;  and  the  noise  rose 

tumultuous. 

19. 

The  sound  thereof  shivered   with  fear  the  hearts  of 

the  Dhritarashtrans, 
Tumultuously  reverberating  from  heaven  to  earth. 

20. 

Then  Arjuna,  beholding  the  Dhritarashtrans  arrayed 

in  order. 
And  the  flight  of  weapons  already  begun,  raised  his 

bow, 

21. 

And  spake  this  word  to  the  god  Krishna,  driver  of 
his  chariot: 

"Draw  up  my  chariot  midway  between  the  two  ar- 
mies, O  deathless  one, 

22. 

"  While  I  survey  those  who  stand  here  eager  for  battle, 
While  I   discern  with  whom   I  must  contend  in  the 
toils  of  war." 

and  is  itself  a  conglomeration  of  different  and  in 
part  contradictory  aspects  of  Hindu  philosophy.  In 
particular  it  sinks  in  one  section  into  that  bog  of 
pantheism  which  lies  always  beside  the  strait  pathway 
of  faith.  The  lines  here  quoted  are  marked  by  the 
number  of  the  book  and  of  the  couplet.  I  have  made 
my  translation  as  close  to  the  original  as  I  could  effect 
consistently  with  English  idiom. 


*>         « 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  49 

24. 

Now  when  the  god  was  thus  addressed  by  Arjuna, 
He  drew  up  the  lordly  chariot  midway  between  the 
two    armies. 

26. 

And  Arjuna  beheld  standing  there  sires  and  grandsires, 
Preceptors,  uncles,  and  brothers,  sons  and  grandsons, 
and  comrades. 

28. 

Great  pity  came  upon  him,  and  in  sorrow  he  spake: 
"  I  see  this  kindred  people,  O  Krishna,  standing  athirst 
for  battle, 

29. 

"And  my  limbs  fail  me,  and  my  mouth  is  parched; 
Trembling  seizes  my  body,  and  the  hair  of  my  flesh 
stands  up. 

31- 

"Omens  of  evil  I  discern,  O  Krishna; 
Neither  do  I  see  any  profit,  if  a  man  slay  his  kindred 
in  battle. 

32- 

"I   yearn   not   after  victory,   neither  after  dominion 

nor  pleasures; 
What  good  have  we  in  dominion,  my  Lord?  in  joys, 

or  in  life  itself? 

35- 

"I  will  not  slay  these,  though  they  kill  me,   dread 

Master; 
No,  not  for  dominion  over  the  three  worlds — how  then 

for  this  earth?" 

4 


50  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

II.     9. 

And  when  Arjuna  had  thus  spoken  to  the  god, 
Saying  to  the  Lord  "I  will  not  fight,"  he  was  silent. 

lO. 

And  to  him  desponding  thus  between  the  two  hosts. 
The  god,  smiling  a  little,  spake  this  word: 

II. 

"Thou  art  grieved  for  those  that  need  no  grief,  yet 

speakest  thou  words  of  wisdom; 
They  that  know  grieve  not  for  the  dead  or  the  living. 

12. 

"Never  forsooth  was  I  not,  nor  thou,  nor  these  com- 
manders; 
Nor  yet  hereafter  shall  any  one  among  us  cease  to  be. 

18. 

"These  are  called  the  corruptible  bodies  of  that  which 

dwelleth  within. 
Eternal,    imperishable,    immeasurable:    therefore    do 

battle,  O  Prince. 

19. 

"He  who  reckoneth  it  the  slayer, 
And  he  who  deemeth  it  the  slain. 
They  both   distinguish  ill; 
This  slayeth  not,  and  it  is  not  slain. 

22. 

"As  a  man  putteth  off  his  outworn  garments. 
And  taketh  other  new  ones, 

So  the  Indweller  putteth  off  these  outworn  bodies, 
And  entereth  into  other  new  ones. 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  51 

3°- 

"He  that  dwelleth  in  each  man's  body  is  forever  in- 
destructible, 

Therefore  for  all  these  creatures  thou  oughtest  not 
to    grieve. 

31- 

"Moreover  regarding  thy  native  right  thou  oughtest 

not  to  waver, 
Since  for  one  born  a  warrior  there  is  no  better  thing 

than  a  righteous  battle. 

33- 

"But   if   thou   undertake  not   this   righteous  contest, 
Then  by  putting  aside  right  and  honour  thou  shalt 
incur  guilt. 

38. 

"Accounting  equal  pleasure  and  pain,  gain  and  loss, 

victory  and  defeat. 
Gird  up  thyself  for  the  battle.     So  thou  shalt  not 

incur  guilt. 

47. 

"Thy  service  is  in  the  work  only,  but  in  the  fruits 

thereof  never; 
Be  not  impelled  by  the  reward  of  works,  neither  be 

attached  to  do  no  work. 

48. 

"Standing  firm  in  devotion  and  putting  away  attach- 
ment, so  ever  work  on,  O  Prince: 

Also  in  success  or  failure  be  tranquil;  tranquillity 
too  is  called  devotion. 


52  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

51- 

"Wise  men,  devout  in  understanding,  reject  the  fruit 

that  is  born  of  works; 
They   are   loosed  from  the   bondage   of  rebirth   and 

depart  unto  a  place  of  well-being. 

52. 

"When  thy  understanding  hath  crossed  over  the  maze 

of  delusion. 
Then  shalt  thou  become  indifferent  to  what  shall  be 

revealed  and  what  hath  been  revealed. 

52- 

"When  thy  understanding,  now  bewildered  by  revela- 
tion, shall  stand  firm. 

Immovable  in  its  contemplation,  then  shalt  thou  attain 
unto   true   devotion. 

62. 

"If  a  man  ponder  things  of  the  senses,  attachment 

ariseth  unto  these; 
And  from  attachment  is  born  desire,  and  from  desire 

springeth  contention. 

64. 

"But  if  a  man  move  among  things  of  the  senses  with 
senses  freed  from  longing  and  aversion, 

And  swayed  by  the  inner  Self,  he  being  self-restrained 
cometh    unto   serenity. 

71- 

"Whosoever   abandoneth   all   desires,   and   goeth   his 

way  without  craving. 
Who  saith  not  This  is  mine  !    This  is  I!  he  cometh 

unto   peace. 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  53 

III.     6. 

"Whosoever  restraineth  outwardly  his  members, 
Yet  continueth  within  his  heart  to  meditate 
The  things  of  the  senses  as  one  self-deluded, 
He  is  called  hypocrite. 


"But  whosoever  in  heart  restraineth  his  senses, 
Yet  outwardly  with  his  members,  O  Arjuna,  taketh  up 
The  devotion  of  works  as  one  without  attachment. 
He  is  the  true  man. 

8. 

"  Do  thou  thy  appointed  work ;  better  is  work  than  no 

work  : 
Even  the  usage  of  thy  body  goeth  not  on  without 

work. 

19. 

"Therefore  without  attachment  ever  lay  hand  to  thy 

peculiar  work. 
For  he  that  doeth  his  work  without  attachment,  he 

attaineth  the  Supreme. 

22. 

"O  son  of  Prithi,  in  all  the  three  worlds  is  no  work 

that  I  must  do; 
There  is  nothing  unattained  that  I  must  attain;  yet 

am  I  at  work. 

23- 

' '  For  if  at  any  time  I  ceased  from  work  through  wear- 
iness, 
All  men  would  follow  in  my  path,  O  son  of  Prithd; 


54  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

24. 

"These  worlds  too  would  disappear  if  I  performed  not 

my  work; 
I  should  become  a  maker  of  confusion  and  bring  the 

people  to  nought. 

25. 

"As  the  ignorant  work  because  of  attachment  to  work, 

O  Prince, 
So  without  attachment  let  him  that  knoweth  work 

for  the  constraining  of  mankind. 

26. 

"Let  him  not  beget  distraction  of  mind  in  the  ignorant 

who  are  attached  to  works; 
But  let  him  rather  lay  hold  and  create  joy  in  all  works, 

as  a  wise  and  devout  man. 

27. 

"Furthermore,  all  works  in  all  places  are  wrought  by 

the  blind  forces  of  nature; 
Only  he  that  is  deluded  by  egotism  thinketh  to  himself 

/  am  the  doer! 

IV.     19. 

"If  all  the  doings  of  a  man  are  devoid  of  the  persua- 
sion of  desire, 

If  all  his  worksare  passed  through  the  fires  of  knowledge, 
then  will  they  of  understanding  call  him  wise. 

22. 

"He  is  equal  in  success  and  failure. 

And  though  he  perform  works,  yet  is  he  not  bound 

thereby ; 
He  is  content  with  what  cometh  of  itself, 
He  is  above  fortune  and  envieth  not. 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  55 

37- 

"As  a  fire  when  kindled  consumeth  its  fuel  unto  ashes, 

O  Arjuna, 
So  the  fire  of  knowledge  consumeth  all  works  unto 

ashes. 

39- 

"He  that  hath  faith  and  is  assiduous, 
He  that  hath  restrained  his  senses,  obtaineth  know- 
ledge; 
And  when  he  hath  got  knowledge, 
Quickly  he  entereth  into  the  supreme  peace." 


Arjuna's  is  the  qualm  of  a  great  heart,  an 
Oriental  Hamlet,  thrust  by  fate  into  the  necessity 
of  stem  action,  and  made  suddenly  aware  of  the 
pity  of  life.  Who  is  he  with  rash  hand  to  slay 
and  preserve,  to  tear  this  tangle  of  individual 
wills  and  like  a  blind  Providence  distribute 
penalty  and  reward  ?  Even  a  righteous  act  may 
circle  out  into  waves  of  endless  pain  and  injus- 
tice, and  there  is  no  assurance  to  the  conscience 
save  in  perfect  quiescence.  The  wise  god  makes 
little  attempt  to  counteract  the  despondency 
of  Arjuna  with  the  passions  of  ambition  and 
indignation,  or  to  balance  right  and  wrong  in 
the  scales  of  the  reason.  He  will  state  the 
paradox  boldly,  and  appeal  for  his  answer  to 
the  sense  of  dualism  within  the  soul  itself. 

There  needs  not  many  words  to  set  forth 
this  uncompromising  adjustment  of  faith  and 


56  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

duty.  The  world,  as  the  god  expounds  it,  is 
not  single  but  double.  Above  all,  or  within  all, 
is  the  one  invisible,  eternal,  incorruptible, 
imperishable: 

If  the  red  slayer  think  he  slays, 
Or  if  the  slain  think  he  is  slain, 

They  know  not  well  the  subtle  ways 
I  keep,  and  pass,  and  turn  again. 

Besides  this  are  the  touchings  of  matter,  the 
many  forms  and  individuals  that  arise  and 
perish,  that  swim  in  the  flux  of  time,  and  the 
feeling  that  we  too,  or  some  part  of  us,  are  illu- 
sions in  the  great  illusion.  No  man,  however  deep 
in  wisdom,  has  ever  seen  the  bond  of  this  one 
and  these  many,  nor  has  any  man  laid  his  finger 
on  the  tie  between  the  knowledge  of  faith  that 
frees  the  soul  from  these  contacts  and  the  de- 
sires and  sorrows  and  joys  of  the  soul  that  hold 
it  down  as  a  seeming  part  of  the  world.  We 
may  deny  our  kinship  to  the  many;  yet  not  for 
a  moment  can  we  live  and  do  nothing,  for  the 
triple  modes  of  nature  (goodness,  passion,  and 
darkness)  hold  us  now  in  their  sway  and  move 
us  this  way  and  that.  As  we  see  no  relation 
between  these  two  realms,  we  have  accordingly 
no  concern  with  ultimate  consequences.  We 
are  in  a  world  of  action,  we  must  act,  we  cannot 
utterly  renounce  and  live;  there  is  but  one 
course  for  us,  to  do  the  duty  that  lies  clear 
before  us,  to  obey  the  station  of  life  in  which 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  57 

we  are  set,  and  leave  the  rest  to  fate.  Ours  is 
not  the  fruit  of  the  work,  but  the  work  itself. 
Equally  by  aversion  as  by  desire  we  become  more 
integrally  part  of  that  which  we  do  or  refrain 
from  doing;  we  must  work,  but  without  attach- 
ment. In  this  way  we  partake  of  the  true 
renunciation,  and  thus  through  morality,  or 
a  conformance  to  duty,  and  not  without  mo- 
rality, we  attain  the  great  liberation. 

There  is  at  first,  no  doubt,  something  like 
the  bleakness  of  the  schools  in  this  doctrine 
of  works  and  inattachment,  yet,  if  we  reflect, 
we  shall  find  that  it  has  its  source  in  the  primi- 
tive knowledge  of  ourselves  and  of  the  world. 
We  look  out  upon  the  welter  of  circumstances 
and  it  seems  to  us  that  the  claims  of  animate 
and  inanimate  nature  cross  each  other  and 
recross  without  purpose  or  plan.  In  the  pain 
and  pleasure  of  sentient  creatures  we  can  often 
detect  only  the  ruling  of  a  blind  fortune.  Here 
the  wicked  and  careless  are  happy;  there  the 
good  man  by  some  venial  fault  or  by  some 
accident  beyond  his  control  is  thrown  into 
pitiable  suffering.  Nature  herself,  in  distribut- 
ing her  rewards  and  penalties  to  the  animal 
world,  is  red-handed  and  cruel  and  unconcerned. 
It  is  not  that  there  is  no  happiness  or  no  corre- 
spondence of  cause  and  effect,  but  that  even  a 
single  foul  discord  destroys  our  confidence  in 
natural  justice.     To  say  that  the  whole  profits 


58  SHELBURNE    ESSAYS 

from  the  loss  of  the  part,  that  the  race  benefits 
from  the  ruin  of  the  individual,  is  a  mere  mockery 
of  the  sufferer.  There  is  absolute  law  in  the 
mechanism  of  matter,  but  sentience  appears  as 
an  alien  to  this  law ;  so  that  the  coming  together 
of  sentience  and  material  energy  results  in  a 
world  of  hideous,  unfathomable  contingency. 
Life  may  be  likened  to  a  feeble  creature  stealing 
its  food  from  amid  the  wheels  of  a  grinding 
engine;  sooner  or  later  comes  the  fatal  slip,  and 
it  is  maimed,  or  crushed  into  dust. 

And  then,  turning  from  this  outward  glance, 
we  look  into  ourselves.  At  first  it  will  seem 
that  we  too  in  our  measure  of  happiness  and 
pain  are  the  sport  of  the  same  blind  Fortune ;  but 
if  we  hold  our  gaze  persistently  upon  ourselves, 
we  begin  to  discern  darkly  that  in  some  un- 
accountable way  our  sorrow  and  joy,  our  profit 
and  loss,  are  parallel  with  our  own  prudence 
and  morality,  and  that  cause  and  effect  rule 
here  as  they  do  in  the  mechanical  world.  It  is 
even  true  that  the  difference  between  the 
enlightened  man  and  the  fool  lies  in  this,  that 
the  one  is  aware  of  some  deep-hidden  respon- 
sibility for  his  own  fate,  whereas  the  other 
complains  of  Fortune.  And  as  our  vision  is 
purged  by  introspection,  and  as  we  dwell  more 
confidently  in  our  higher  intuitions,  we  have 
always  a  stronger  intimation  of  some  law  of 
moral  recompense  extending  from  the  present 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  59 

into  an  indefinitely  remote  past;  our  state  is 
no  longer  an  isolated  momentary  accident, 
but  the  inevitable  consequence  of  our  own  will 
forever  forging  the  chains  in  which  it  is  bound. 
This  is  the  doctrine  of  karma,  of  works,  which 
teaches  that  as  a  man  sows  he  shall  reap,  and 
projects  itself  into  some  myth  of  an  original 
Fall  or  of  transmigration: 

If  the  Creator  moulding  goodly  man 
A  pearl  designed  him  to  adorn  the  earth, 
And  then  so  fragile  made  that  at  the  birth 

It  breaketh, — whose  the  folly  of  the  plan? 

Rather,  this  World  for  ever  as  a  wheel 
Itself  revolveth;  sure,  no  guilty  hand 
Propelled  it,  nor  shall  any  bid  it  stand, 

Nor  any  wit  a  primal  cause  reveal. 

And  thou,  my  Soul,  the  same  unlaurelled  race 
Art  dragging  on  through  weary  change  of  form; 
Nay,  if  to-day  thou  murmur  in  the  storm, 

Blame  yesterday  and  choose  to-morrow's  place. 

So  it  is  that  self-knowledge,  or  the  turning 
from  our  lower  to  our  higher  self,  and  the  sense 
of  responsibility  develop  together,  are  indeed 
the  same  thing,  and  that  through  them  we  are 
made  aware  of  our  real  separation  from  the 
welter  of  chance  as  this  appears  to  us  in  the 
lives  of  others  where  we  see  only  the  physical 
events.  Morality  is  the  acceptance  of  this  sense 
of  responsibility,  springing  from  intuition  and 
denying  outer  vision;  and  thus  by  duty  alone 


6o  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

we  are  carried  onward  to  the  dawning  of  the 
joyous  liberation,  to  the  escape  from  illusory 
connection  with  the  world,  and  to  the  consum- 
mation of  peace.  We  are  moral  in  so  far  as  we 
know  ourselves  unconcerned  in  the  sphere  where 
morality  acts;  we  know  ourselves  unconcerned 
in  so  far  as  we  act  morally  in  that  sphere.  Such 
is  the  paradox  of  works  and  inatiachment  as 
propounded  by  the  sages  of  India.  It  is  not  a 
rationalised  solution  of  the  antinomy  of  faith 
and  practice,  for  inattachment  is  simply  another 
name  for  our  ignorance  of  the  relation  Between 
the  two  spheres;  it  is  a  sufficient,  and  to  him 
who  falters  it  may  be  a  terrible,  rule  of  conduct. 
Works  and  inattachment  and  liberation, 
karma  and  asanga  and  moksha,  are  hard  words 
in  our  modern  ears;  yet  they  might  sound  less 
strange  if  we  stopped  to  consider  their  many 
correspondences  with  familiar  moods.  We 
should  discover,  I  think,  that  the  idea  they 
express  runs  like  a  binding  cord  through  all  the 
manifold  religious  confessions  of  our  own  civili- 
sation. Plato  develops  it  at  length  in  his 
account  of  the  philosophers  who  must  for  a 
time  abandon  the  delights  of  pure  contem- 
plation for  the  harsh  duties  of  statecraft,  looking 
not  for  emoluments  and  honours,  which  are 
no  concern  of  the  liberal  mind,  but  obeying 
the  compulsion  of  justice  and  righteousness. 
In    the    Meditations    of    Marcus    Aurelius    the 


THE    BHAGAVAD    GITA  6 1 

pathos  of  this  severance  of  faith  and  duty- 
speaks  in  every  line.  There  is  nothing  sadder 
than  the  spectacle  of  that  tremulous  soul  torn 
from  the  philosophic  cloister  to  preside  over 
the  affairs  of  an  empire  as  incongruous  in  its 
elements  as  the  world  itself.  Like  the  Hindu 
prince  he  winced  at  the  tragic  necessity  of 
laying  hand  upon  this  tangle  of  events  with 
no  clue  to  its  labyrinth  of  pain  and  pleasure: — 
"Toys  and  fooleries  at  home;  wars  abroad: 
sometimes  terror,  sometimes  torpor,  or  stupid 
sloth:  this  is  my  daily  slavery."  And  like  that 
prince  he  discerned  no  exit  to  religion  save 
through  fulfilling  the  obligations  of  his  place 
as  he  saw  them,  leaving  the  issue  to  destiny 
and  withdrawing  his  heart  from  hope  and  fear. 
' '  In  the  morning  when  thou  findest  thyself 
unwilling  to  rise,"  he  says,  "consider  with 
thyself  presently,  it  is  to  go  about  a  man's  work 
that  I  am  stirred  up.  Am  I  then  yet  unwilling 
to  go  about  that  for  which  I  myself  was  bom 
and  brought  forth  into  this  world?  .  .  .  Fit 
and  accommodate  thyself  to  that  estate  and 
to  those  occurrences,  which  by  the  destinies 
have  been  annexed  unto  thee.  .  .  .  We  all 
work  to  one  effect,  some  willingly,  and  with 
rational  apprehension  of  what  we  do:  others 
without  any  such  knowledge.  .  .  .  These,  the 
events  of  purposes,  are  not  things  required  in 
a  man.     The  nature  of  man  doth  not  profess 


62  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

any  such  things.  The  final  ends  and  consum- 
mations of  actions  are  nothing  at  all  to  a  man's 
nature.  ...  So  live  as  indifferent  to  the  world 
and  all  worldly  objects,  as  one  who  liveth  by 
himself  alone  upon  some  desert  hill."  It  is 
thus,  while  preserving  himself  unattached,  that 
he  lived  life  well,  even  in  a  palace. 

The  same  moral  may  be  traced  through  the 
religion  of  the  Middle  Ages,  with  the  changed 
accent  of  Christianity.  It  is  the  meaning  of 
the  common  proverb  Laborare  est  orare.  It 
can  be  extracted  even  from  that  most  cloistered 
of  books.  The  Imitation:  "Sine  caritate  opus 
externum  nihil  prodest — without  charity  the 
external  work  is  of  no  profit";  for  this  charity 
is  the  love  of  God  in  which  all  love  of  self  with 
all  thought  of  others  as  ephemeral  creatures 
is  swallowed  up,  and  in  which  the  temporal 
aspects  of  work  lose  their  significance.  "Oh, 
if  a  man  had  but  a  spark  of  true  love,  surely 
he  would  feel  that  all  earthly  things  are  full 
of  vanity!" 

And  again  in  modem  literature — if  not  of 
to-day,  at  least  of  yesterday — a  similar  note  is 
heard.  Carlyle  caught  it  up  from  Goethe  and 
uttered  it  with  savage  emphasis:  "The  latest 
Gospel  in  this  world  is.  Know  thy  work  and 
do  it.  .  .  .  The  deep  Death-kingdoms,  the 
Stars  in  their  never-resting  courses,  all  Space 
and  Time,  proclaim  it  to  thee  in  continual  silent 


THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA  63 

admonition.  Thou  too,  if  ever  man  should, 
shalt  work  while  it  is  called  To-day,  For  the 
Night  cometh,  wherein  no  man  can  work.  .  .  . 
Nay,  at  bottom,  dost  thou  need  any  reward?  .  .  . 
My  brother,  the  brave  man  has  to  give  his 
Life  away.  .  .  .  Give  it,  like  a  royal  heart;  let 
the  price  be  Nothing:  thou  hast  then,  in  a  cer- 
tain sense,  got  All  for  it." 

These  and  many  other  examples  can  be 
drawn  from  the  teachers  of  the  West.  Their 
accent  is  diverse,  they  may  even  seem  at  first 
to  be  speaking  in  different  tongues,  but  if  their 
intention  is  regarded  more  narrowly,  they  will 
be  found  still  repeating  from  their  own  ex- 
perience the  ancient,  inevitable  lesson  of  the 
Bhagavad  Gita: 

III.    30. 

"Committing  all  works  unto  me,  with  heart  fixed  on 

the  Eternal  Self, 
Without    expectation,    saying    not      This    is   mine, 

without  grief,  so  gird  thyself  for  the  battle. 

31- 

"Verily  those  men  that  follow  ever  this  saying, 
That  have  faith,  and  murmur  not,  they  are  set  free 
from  their  works." 

There  indeed,  if  anywhere,  lies  the  truth; 
yet  it  is  possible  that  the  same  verity  can  be 
found  in  other  teachers,  pre-eminently  in  Plato 
it  may  appear,  not  so  purely  and  unflinchingly 


64  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

expressed,  but,  just  because  of  its  lesser  austerity 
and  its  larger  recognition  of  intermediate  com- 
promises, a  safer  light  for  the  path  of  stumbling 
men  and  more  competent  to  bring  them,  all 
save  the  few  who  desire  to  enter  the  Kingdom 
by  violence,  to  the  far-off  yet  ever-present 
goal. 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE 

It  seems  to  be  a  pretty  common  experience, 
among  those  who  have  passed  through  more 
than  one  phase  of  beHef,  that  at  the  critical 
moment  of  hesitation  some  chance  volume, 
falling  in  with  the  time  and  the  mood,  should 
furnish  a  guiding  impulse  to  the  mind  in  its 
new  course ;  that  in  a  lesser  way  we  should  all 
of  us  have  our  Tolle,  lege.  Naturally  we  cherish 
the  memory  of  such  a  book  with  a  peculiar 
fondness,  though  we  may  never  open  it  again; 
we  even  hold  it  an  act  of  piety  one  day  to  make 
confession  of  our  obligations.  And  so  I  may 
be  pardoned  for  a  word  of  personal  reminiscence 
here  in  naming  the  work  which  inducted  me 
into  the  reading  of  Saint  Augustine  and  into 
the  comparative  study  of  religions.  Having 
dropped  away  from  allegiance  to  the  creed  of 
Calvin,  I  had  for  a  number  of  years  sought  a 
substitute  for  faith  in  the  increase  of  know- 
ledge ;  like  many  another  I  thought  to  conceal 
from  myself  the  want  of  intellectual  purpose 
in  miscellaneous  curiosity.  And  then,  just  as 
the  vanity  of  this  pursuit  began  to  grow  too 
insistent,  came  the  unexpected  index  pointing 
5  65 


66  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

to  the  new  way, — no  slender  oracle,  but  the 
ponderous  and  right  German  utterance  of 
Baur's  Manichdisches  Religionssystem.  It  would 
be  impossible  to  convey  to  others,  I  cannot 
quite  recall  to  myself,  the  excitement  amount- 
ing almost  to  a  physical  perturbation  caused 
by  this  first  glimpse  into  the  mysteries  of  inde- 
pendent faith.  It  was  not,  I  need  scarcely 
say,  that  I  failed  even  then  to  see  the  extrav- 
agance and  materialistic  tendencies  of  the 
Manichaean  superstition;  but  its  highly  elaborate 
form,  not  without  elements  of  real  sublimity, 
acted  as  a  powerful  stimulus  to  the  imagi- 
nation. Here,  symbolised  by  the  cosmic  con- 
flict of  light  and  darkness,  was  found  as  in  a 
great  epic  poem  the  eternal  problem  of  good 
and  evil,  of  the  thirst  for  happiness  and  the 
reality  of  suffering,  which  I  knew  to  lie  at  the 
bottom  of  religious  thought  and  emotion.  How 
shall  monotheism  account  for  this  discord  of  the 
world?  On  the  one  hand  you  may  accept  the 
notion  of  an  all-determining  Governor,  and 
forthwith  you  must  shudder  to  behold  the  guilt 
of  mankind  laid  at  his  feet.  On  the  other  hand 
you  may  assume  that  man  has  been  created 
free  to  choose,  and  you  have  the  incredible 
fact  (the  monstrum,  as  Augustine  called  it) 
that  he  has  deliberately  elected  his  own  dam- 
nation. There  is  no  escape  from  the  dilemma, 
however  artfully  the  two  terms  may  be  juggled 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  67 

together;  and  system  after  system  of  theology 
has  been  shattered  against  this  perplexity. 
The  most  dishonest  solution  is  that  ascription 
of  supreme  Jesuitry  to  God,  whereby  he  is 
supposed  to  create  evil  that  good  may  come, 
the  velut  officiosa  mendacia  of  the  Church;  the 
most  stultifying  that  which  complacently  shuts 
its  eyes  to  the  existence  of  evil. 

Now  Manichasism  not  only  concealed  the 
troublesome  problem  of  the  human  conscience 
by  transferring  the  dilemma  to  a  vast  spectacular 
division  of  nature,  but,  through  its  influence  on 
Saint  Augustine,  serves  as  a  bridge  between  the 
Orient  and  the  Occident.  It  offers  a  middle 
term  between  the  dualism  of  India  and  that  of 
Europe,  and  in  this  way  is  the  key  to  much 
that  is  otherwise  obscure  in  our  own  religious 
history.  Certainly  the  first  step  towards  any 
right  understanding  of  Augustine  himself  must 
come  from  a  study  of  this  heresy — as  he  would 
call  it,  though  it  was  in  reality  an  independent 
religion — from  which,  as  his  enemies  taunted 
him,  he  never  entirely  shook  himself  free. 

And  there  is  no  difficulty  in  understanding 
how  he  became  entangled  in  those  fantastic 
sophistries.  It  was  the  purpose  of  his  Confes- 
sions, and  history  has  commonly  followed  him 
in  this,  to  emphasise  the  difference  between  his 
Christian  and  ante-Christian  career;  but  a  deeper, 
or  less  partial,  reading  of  his  life  shows  rather 


68  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  unchanging  temperament  of  the  man 
through  all  his  variations  of  creed.  His  mission 
was  to  convict  the  world  of  sin;  his  preaching 
might  be  summed  up  in  the  exclamation :  "You 
have  not  yet  considered  how  great  is  the  burden 
of  sin — Nondum  considerasti  quanti  ponderis 
sit  peccatum!"  And  this  cry  for  regeneration 
was  the  voice  of  faith  speaking  within  him. 
"Nothing  have  I  but  will,"  he  says  in  the 
Soliloquies;  "I  know  nothing  but  this,  that 
things  fleeting  and  transitory  should  be  spumed, 
that  things  certain  and  eternal  should  be 
sought."  Than  this,  I  venture  to  assert,  no 
better  definition  of  elementary,  universal  faith 
has  ever  been  enounced:  Nihil  aliud  habeo 
quant  voluntatem;  nihil  aliud  scio  nisi  fluxa  et 
caduca  spernenda  esse,  certa  et  (sterna  requirenda. 
Or,  as  he  develops  the  idea  in  one  of  the  earli- 
est of  his  letters : 

We  are,  I  suppose,  both  agreed  in  maintaining  that 
all  things  with  which  our  bodily  senses  acquaint  us 
are  incapable  of  abiding  unchanged  for  a  single  moment 
but,  on  the  contrary,  are  moving  and  in  perpetual 
transition,  and  have  no  present  reality,  that  is,  to 
use  the  language  of  Latin  philosophy,  do  not  exist — 
ut  latine  loquar,  non  esse.  Accordingly,  the  true  and 
divine  philosophy  admonishes  us  to  check  and  subdue 
the  love  of  these  things  as  most  dangerous  and  dis- 
astrous, in  order  that  the  mind,  even  while  using  this 
body,  may  be  wholly  occupied  and  warmly  interested 
in  those  things  which  are  ever  the  same,  and  which 
owe  their  attractive  power  to  no  transient  charm. 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  69 

The  expression  of  the  idea  is  here  coloured 
by  his  newly  acquired  Platonism,  but  the  dual- 
ism that  underlies  it  passes  unbroken  through 
his  life,  making  one  the  Pagan  child  and  the 
Christian  man.     He  was  not  reading  his  pres- 
ent   into    the    past,    but    only    explaining   by 
clearer  knowledge  the  blind  uncertainties  and 
searchings   of   his   youth,   when,   looking  back 
on  those  days,  he  wrote:  "  For  this  was  my  sin, 
that  not  in  God  himself,  but  in  his  creatures, 
in  myself  and  others,  I  sought  my  pleasures, 
my   exaltations,   and   my   truths,    and   so   fell 
into  sorrows  and  confusions  and  errors."     This 
constant    preoccupation   with    the    dualism   of 
human  experience  was  the  master  trait  of  his 
mind;  but  with  it  must  be  reckoned  another 
trait  almost,  if  not  quite,  equally  predominant. 
He  was  intensely,  even  morbidly,  self-conscious; 
all  the  relations  of  life  assumed  a  vivid  personal 
colour,  and  from  this  somewhat  unstable  union 
of  abstract  faith  with  a  hungering  personality 
sprang  the  poignancy  of  his  emotions.     Such  a 
discord  in  harmony  can  be  seen  at  work  in  his 
passionately   cherished   friendships;   and   some 
of  his  younger  letters  may  almost  bring  tears 
to   the   reader's   eyes   for  their  mingling   and 
conflict  of  human  and  divine  love.     So,  writing 
to   Nebridius   in  his  early   Christian   days,   he 
expresses  their  mutual  longing  to  be  together 
in  the  flesh,   and  then  adds  this  consolation: 


70  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

** Commune  with  your  own  soul,  and  raise  it 
up,  as  far  as  you  are  able,  unto  God.  For  in 
Him  you  hold  us  also  by  a  firmer  bond,  not 
by  means  of  bodily  images."  In  the  same  way, 
reflecting  on  the  great  sorrow  of  his  Pagan 
youth,  when  through  the  death  of  his  friend 
he  walked  about  in  astonishment  that  any  life 
remained  on  earth,  this  was  his  thought: 
"Blessed  is  he  who  loves  Thee,  and  his  friend 
in  Thee,  and  his  enemy  because  of  Thee;  for 
he  alone  loses  no  one  dear,  to  whom  all  are  dear 
in  Him  who  is  not  lost."  He  knew  that  the 
peculiar  bitterness  of  his  grief  arose  from  con- 
sciousness of  having  looked  for  the  beatific 
life  in  the  region  of  death — beatam  vitam  in 
regione  mortis. 

Such  was  the  temperament  of  the  young 
man  who  in  his  eighteenth  year  came  to  Carthage 
as  a  student  of  rhetoric,  as  it  was  then  called, 
of  the  liberal  arts,  as  we  should  say  now.  He 
had  been  bom  in  the  year  354  at  Thagaste,  a 
small  town  of  Numidian  Africa,  some  fifty 
miles  inland  from  the  Hippo  which  he  was 
afterwards  to  make  the  centre  of  the  religious 
world.  Africa  had  been  thoroughly  Romanised, 
although  the  Punic  language  was  still  spoken 
by  the  lower  orders ;  and  indeed  Augustine  in  one 
of  his  letters  asks  about  the  pronunciation  of 
some  of  the  commonest  Latin  words,  and  when 
in  Milan  suffered  as  a  teacher  of  rhetoric  from 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  7 1 

his  provincial  accent.  But  Carthage  at  least, 
since  its  rebuilding,  was  like  a  lesser  Rome, 
splendid  with  temples  and  palaces  and  baths, 
thronged  with  people  whose  occupation  was  to 
follow  the  Pagan  ceremonies  of  worship,  to 
watch  the  spectacle  of  the  streets  and  theatres, 
to  hear  the  rhetoricians,  and  to  indulge  in  the 
unrestrained  vices  of  the  capital.  And  now 
at  last  the  prophecy  of  Dido  was  to  come  true; 
her  city  was  to  see  the  avenger  arise  who  should 
make  good  the  failure  of  Hannibal  and  give 
laws  to  Rome. 

The  ambition  of  the  young  Augustine  was 
stirred  by  the  life  of  Carthage,  but  it  does  not 
appear  that  its  vices  offered  any  strong  allure- 
ment to  him.  Rather  it  was  at  this  time  that 
the  eager  desire  for  the  truth  began  to  stir 
within  him.  He  attributes  this  first  conversion 
to  the  study  of  Cicero's  lost  book,  Hortensius, 
but  one  is  inclined  to  look  for  the  cause  in  the 
impression  upon  his  sensitive  nature  of  a  flaunt- 
ing and  gorgeous  materialism.  To  one  of  his 
temper,  coming  from  the  country  to  the  tumult 
of  the  city,  this  would  be  the  natural  result. 
For  a  brief  moment  the  blood  would  be  heated 
by  the  seductions  of  the  senses,  and  then  in- 
evitably the  feeling  of  contrast  and  conflict 
would  be  intensified  between  his  spirit  and  the 
world.  In  his  immature  state  he  was  a  ready 
victim  for  a  religious  sect  which  should  expand 


72  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

this  combat  within  his  mind  into  a  mythological 
scheme  of  the  universe.  Carthage  was  one  of 
the  centres  of  the  Manichcean  propaganda,  and 
Augustine  was  soon  a  convert.  For  nine  years 
he  called  himself  a  disciple  of  the  Babylonian; 
he  never  to  the  day  of  his  death  outlived  the 
effects  of  this  first  surrender  of  his  soul  to  a 
definite  creed. 

Several  important  studies  of  Manichaeism 
have  been  published  since  Baur's  work,  chief 
of  them  being  Gustav  Fliigel's  Mani,  seine 
Lehre  und  seine  Schriften,  which  gives  the  text 
and  translation,  with  notes,  of  a  portion  of  the 
Fihrist  of  Muhammed  ben  Ishak,  an  encyclopas- 
dia  of  the  sciences  written,  probably  at  Bagdad, 
in  the  tenth  century.  A  later  study  is  Kessler's 
Mani,  which  undertakes,  with  imperfect  success, 
to  discover  the  origin  of  the  myth  not  in  Persian 
Zoroastrianism  but  in  the  ancient  nature-worship 
of  Babylonia.  Both  of  these  works  add  to  our 
detailed  knowledge  of  the  sect  and  serve  to 
supplement  the  views  derived  by  Baur  from 
Western  sources ;  but  both  tend  also  to  obscure 
its  essential  position  in  history.  For  it  was 
the  Manichseism  of  the  Latin  West,  as  modified 
by  closer  contact  with  Christianity  and  as 
presented  in  the  treatises  of  Saint  Augustine, 
that  for  a  while  strove  with  Neo-Platonism 
and  Catholicism  for  the  mastery  of  our  world, 
and  that  left  its  deep  imprint  on  the  civilisation 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  73 

of  Europe.  But  it  is  to  be  noted  that  neither 
Baur,  who  presents  the  Manichaeism  of  the 
West,  nor  the  two  later  writers,  who  go  to 
the  Eastern  sources,  offer  any  clear  view  of  the 
possible  relation  of  this  religion  to  the  still 
further  East  of  India.  Now  it  would  be  rash 
to  assert  positively  that  Mani  borrowed  in  any 
substantial  way  from  Buddhism;  a  very  little 
experience  in  the  comparative  study  of  religions 
oueht  to  make  one  cautious  in  these  seductive 
theories  of  derivation;  but  it  is  at  least  true 
that  in  many  of  its  details  the  worship  instituted 
by  Mani  forms  a  curious  parallel  to  that  of 
Buddha;  and  it  is  also  true  that  in  its  essential 
doctrine  Manichsism  offers  at  once  an  interest- 
ing resemblance  and  contrast  to  the  common 
faith  of  India.  In  a  general  study  of  religious 
dualism  it  thus  in  ever}^  way  affords  an  invalu- 
able bridge  between  the  Orient  and  the  Occident. 
This  strange  religion,  which  was  promulgated 
by  ]\Iani,  a  Persian,  in  the  third  century  of  our 
era,  and  which  spread  rapidly  from  Babylon 
as  far  east  as  China  and  westward  with  the 
Roman  Empire,  is  an  admirable  example  of  the 
syncretic  method  of  thought  of  the  age.  It 
should  appear  to  be  the  deliberate  attempt  of 
a  reformer  to  fuse  into  a  homogeneous  system 
Zoroastrianism  and  Christianity,  the  two  re- 
ligions then  struggling  for  supremacy  on  the 
borderland  of  the  Persian  Empire.     It  may  be 


74  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

that  the  Zoroastrianism  which  forms  the  basis 
of  the  mixture  is  tinged  with  the  old  Semitic 
superstitions  still  prevalent  in  Assyria;  doubt- 
less, the  Christian  elements  adopted  are  Gnostic 
rather  than  orthodox.  The  influence  of  India, 
if  present  at  all,  is  more  obscure;  yet  even 
here  historic  probability  is  not  wanting.  It  is 
known  from  Chinese  annals  that  the  Buddhist 
propaganda  was  active  in  Bactria  and  Parthia 
in  the  early  Christian  centuries.  It  is  further 
recorded  in  the  Fihrist  that  Mani  travelled  for 
forty  years,  visiting  the  Hindus,  the  Chinese, 
and  the  inhabitants  of  Chorasan.  Some  tra- 
dition also  of  Buddhistic  sources  seems  to  have 
lingered  in  the  memory  of  the  early  chroniclers; 
and,  as  so  often  happens,  these  abstract  ideas 
became  personified,  and  figure  with  fabulous 
names  among  the  followers  of  the  prophet. 

When  we  pass  from  historical  to  internal 
evidence,  the  parallel  becomes,  if  not  more  con- 
vincing, at  least  more  instructive.  It  has  been 
remarked  that  Hindu  thought  moves  in  cycles. 
Certainly,  during  the  centuries  just  before  and 
after  our  era,  we  see  such  a  wave  of  thought 
sweep  over  India,  changing  the  whole  religious 
and  intellectual  life  of  the  people.  The  Sankhyan 
philosophy,  Buddhism,  Jainism,  and  the  Krishna 
cult  apparently  arose  and  developed  side  by 
side,  being  the  various  aspects  of  one  great 
revolution.     Their  points  of  contact  are  numer- 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  75 

ous  and  essential;  and  doubtless,  if  the  complete 
literature  of  the  time  were  at  our  command, 
their  origin  and  growth  would  show  still  more 
striking  phases  of  resemblance.  Now  details 
of  belief  and  worship  may  be  detected  in  Mani- 
chaeism  which  appear  to  be  borrowed  from  one 
and  another  of  these  cults ;  but  beyond  this  a  yet 
deeper  influence  suggests  itself,  such  as  might 
be  expected  in  the  mind  of  a  searcher  after  the 
truth  who  was  brought  into  the  circle  of  that 
tremendous  moral  and  intellectual    ferment. 

His  religion  starts  with  the  Zoroastrian  myth 
of  two  co-eternal  and  hostile  powers,  of  good 
and  of  evil,  of  light  and  of  darkness.  The 
contest  between  them  comes  about  in  this  way : 
The  regnuni  lucis  is  threatened  with  invasion 
by  the  principes  tenebrarum,  who  from  the 
dark  abyss  behold  the  upper  light  and  become 
enamoured  of  its  glory.  Thereupon  an  emana- 
tion of  God,  called  the  Primus  Homo,  descends 
into  the  depths  to  combat  them.  The  five  gross 
elements  of  matter  belong  to  the  regnum  tenebra- 
rum, and  to  prepare  himself  to  meet  them  he 
first  arms  himself  with  a  panoply  of  the  five 
finer  elements  representing  their  psychical  coun- 
terpart. (Cf.  the  Hindu  tanmdtras  and  mahd- 
bhtltas.)  For  the  time  he  is  overwhelmed  by 
Eblis,  or  Saclas,  as  the  leader  of  the  demons  is 
sometimes  called;  part  of  his  panoply  is  rent 
away  from  him,  and  out  of  the  union  of  these 


76  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

finer  elements,  or  soul,  with  the  gross  matter 
of  the  regnum  ienebrarum  arises  the  existing 
order  of  things,  the  soul  being  held  by  restraint 
in  the  bonds  of  matter,  and  giving  to  matter 
its  form  and  life. 

The  process  of  redemption  is  the  point  of 
contact  with  Christianity,  and  from  here  on  the 
heresy  will  be  found  Christian  rather  than 
Persian,  although  the  modifying  influence  of 
the  Persian  Mithra  cult  shows  itself  strongly. 
In  other  words,  speaking  broadly,  Mani's 
system  may  be  divided  into  two  great  periods, — 
one  of  involution,  or  mingling  of  spirit  and 
matter,  adopted  from  Zoroastrian  sources;  and 
the  second  of  evolution,  or  the  separating  of 
spirit  and  matter,  borrowed  chiefly  from  the 
Christian  faith.  But  the  Christianity  followed 
has  the  colour  rather  of  the  Gnostic  sect  than 
of  the  orthodox  confession.  The  common 
terminology  and  ritual  are  maintained,  but 
the  mission  of  the  Christos  is  extended  and, 
in  a  way,  deepened.  The  labour  of  salvation 
is  no  longer  confined  to  the  action  of  a  man,  or 
god-man,  living  his  life  in  Palestine,  but  be- 
comes the  cosmic  struggle  of  the  world-spirit 
striving  upward  toward  deliverance.  St,  Paul 
hinted  at  the  same  idea  in  his  mystical  words: 
"The  whole  creation  groaneth  and  travaileth 
in  pain  together";  but  he  showed  how  far 
Christian  orthodoxy  stood  from  its  rival  when 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  77 

he  added:  "until  now  .  .  .  waiting  for  the  adop- 
tion, to  wit  the  redemption  of  our  body." 

To  be  more  precise,  Mani  distinguishes  be- 
tween a  Christos  and  Jesus.  The  general 
name  of  the  emanation  from  the  kingdom  of 
light  is  the  Primus  Homo;  but  this  is  regarded 
in  two  ways,  as  a  passive  principle  (8wVa/iis 
iraOrjTLK:^)  suffering  the  bondage  of  the  world,  and 
as  an  active  principle  (Swa/its  BrjfxiovpyLKy'i)  effect- 
ing its  own  deliverance.  Now  the  former  is 
called  the  Jesus  patibilis,  while  the  latter  is 
the  Christos.  When  the  world  was  created  out 
of  the  union  of  the  spiritual  Primus  Homo  and 
the  material  regnuni  teticbranim,  the  purest 
port-ion  of  the  mixture,  that  containing  the  most 
light,  was  placed  in  the  sky  as  the  sun  and  moon. 
Their  light,  together  with  the  atmosphere 
(which  is  the  Holy  Ghost),  acting  on  the  earth, 
produces  life;  life  is  the  struggle  of  the  impris- 
oned soul  upward  toward  reabsorption  into  the 
kingdom  of  light.  In  this  process  the  sun  and 
moon  (called  also  the  Primus  Homo,  the  Son 
of  God,  as  containing  the  purest  body  of  the 
life-giving  light)  are  the  Christos;  whereas  the 
spirit  dormant  in  the  earth  and  awakened  by 
their  touch  is  the  Jesus  patibilis.  Every  tree 
that  expands  its  leaves  in  the  warm  breath  of 
heaven,  every  flower  that  paints  its  blossoms 
with  the  colours  of  the  sky,  is  only  an  expression 
of  the  upward  striving  of  the  weary  spirit.     So 


78  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  agony  of  the  crucifixion  became  symbolical 
of  the  universal  passion,  and  Jesus  was  said  to 
be  omni  suspensus  ex  ligno.  The  feeling  which 
inspired  this  conception  of  the  suffering  Jesus 
is  beautifully  told  in  a  stanza  of  Omar  Khayyam : 

Now  the  New  Year  reviving  old  Desires, 
The  thoughtful  Soul  to  Solitude  retires, 

Where  the  White  Hand  of  Moses  on  the  Bough 
Puts  out,  and  Jesus  from  the  Ground  suspires. 

When  the  demons  of  evil  see  that  the  light 
in  their  possession  is  thus  gradually  withdrawn 
from  them,  they  are  thrown  into  dismay.  They 
conspire  among  themselves,  and,  by  a  curious 
process  of  procreating  and  then  devouring  their 
offspring,  produce  man,  who  contains  the 
quintessence  of  all  the  spiritual  light  remaining 
to  them.  Adam  is  begotten  by  Saclas  and 
Nebrod,  their  leaders,  in  the  likeness  of  the 
Primus  Homo.  To  him  is  given  the  glory  of 
the  world ;  he  is  made  the  microcosm  or  counter- 
part of  the  universe,  in  order  that  by  the  ex- 
cellence of  his  nature,  as  by  a  bait,  the  soul 
may  be  allured  to  remain  in  the  body.  He  is 
created  by  the  lust  of  the  demons;  his  own 
fall,  designed  by  his  creators,  consists  in  suc- 
cumbing to  the  seductions  of  the  flesh;  and 
through  the  process  of  generation  the  spirit 
is  still  held  a  bond-slave  in  the  world,  pass- 
ing from  father  to  son.  But  man,  though  he 
may  be  subject  for  a  time  to  the  evil  influence 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  79 

of  the  flesh,  yet  must  rise  in  the  end  by  the 
eternal  aspiration  of  the  spirit.  As  the  Christos 
acting  in  the  sun  awakens  the  inanimate  earth, 
so  too  he  appears  as  a  man  among  men,  as 
Jesus  of  Nazareth,  teaching  the  way  of  sal- 
vation. Release  comes  only  with  the  cessation 
of  desire,  and  this  again  is  brought  about  only 
through  the  true  knowledge,  or  gnosis,  imparted 
by  the  Saviour. 

In  all  this  we  see  strong  traces  of  the 
Zoroastrian  sun-worship,  as  might  be  expected. 
The  Christos  represented  as  distentus  per  so- 
lem  lunamque  points  at  once  to  Mithra,  the 
sun-god  and  mediator.  But  the  significant 
modification  recalls  rather  the  spirit  of  India. 
The  whole  conception  of  Christ's  mission  is 
changed ;  and  the  labour  of  his  life  is  to  proclaim 
the  way  of  release  to  the  spirit  already  groping 
upward,  rather  than  to  act  as  mediator  between 
man  and  God.  His  incarnation  is  only  one 
brief  event  in  the  long  struggle  of  the  imprisoned 
Jesus  for  release.  In  accordance  with  this  idea, 
either  directly  from  India  or  through  the  earlier 
Gnostic  sects,  the  doctrine  of  Docetism  was 
adopted,  corresponding  to  the  Maya  which 
plays  so  large  a  role  in  later  Buddhism  and  in 
the  Krishna  cult.  For  instance  we  read  in  the 
Bhdgavata  Purdna  of  Krishna:  "It  is  through 
his  Maya,  by  means  of  Maya,  that  the  Exalted 
One  has  taken  on  himself  a  body  "  ;  and  again 


8o  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  Buddha  in  The  Lotus  of  the  True  Law:  "  The 
Tathagata,  who  so  long  ago  was  perfectly  en- 
lightened, is  unlimited  in  the  duration  of  his 
life;  he  is  everlasting.  Without  being  extinct, 
the  Tathagata  makes  a  show  of  extinction,  on 
behalf  of  those  who  have  to  be  educated." 
Precisely  the  same  words  might  be  used  to 
express  the  Gnostic  and  Manichasan  doctrine 
of  the  Christ. 

So  too  the  conception  of  sin  as  consisting  in 
desire  instead  of  disobedience,  and  the  resulting 
system  of  ethics,  point  to  India.  The  chief 
duty  of  man  is  to  abstain  from  satisfaction  of 
physical  desires  of  whatever  sort,  that  he  may 
not  plunge  the  soul  still  deeper  in  the  slough  of 
creation.  Marriage  was  abhorred  as  evil  above 
all  things,  in  contradiction  to  Persian  and 
orthodox  Christian  views.  And  after  chastity 
the  highest  virtue  was  a  respect  for  life  in  all 
its  forms,  carried  almost  to  the  absurd  extremi- 
ties of  the  Jainist  rule  of  ahinsd  (from  a  privative 
and  kins,  to  harm,  kill). 

The  followers  of  Mani  were  divided  into  two 
bodies,  the  electi  and  the  auditores,  correspond- 
ing to  the  classes  of  Christians,  and  the  use  of 
the  Christian  sacraments  shows  that  the  Church 
was  organised  after  Western  models;  yet  here 
again  the  duties  of  the  auditors  remind  us 
rather  of  the  Buddhist  updsakas  than  of  Chris- 
tian   catechumens.     Like    the    updsakas    they 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  8 1 

were  allowed  to  marry  and  mingle  with  the 
world,  and  their  connection  with  the  elect 
consisted  mainly  in  providing  the  latter  with 
food,  in  order  that  these  vessels  of  salvation 
might  be  spared  the  awful  sin  of  destroying  even 
vegetable  life.  At  death  the  souls  of  the  elect 
were  transported  up  to  the  kingdom  of  light, 
into  a  state  of  being  not  unlike  the  Nirvana 
of  the  Jainas,  and  possibly  of  the  Buddhists. 
The  auditors  passed  through  a  long  series  of 
transmigrations,  while  the  wicked  were  cast  into 
hell. 

It  is  easy  to  understand  how  an  immature 
youth  of  Augustine's  temperament  was  drawn 
from  the  worldly  pageantry  of  Carthage  by  this 
religion  of  Mani.  Here  was  an  easy  solution 
of  the  mystery  that  weighed  upon  his  mind, 
the  quanti  ponderis  sit  peccatum;  here  was  an 
elaborate  interpretation  of  that  conflict  between 
the  fluxa  et  caduca  and  the  certa  et  cBterna  which 
it  was  the  labour  of  his  life  to  explain.  Nor  is 
it  difficult,  on  the  other  hand,  to  understand 
why  the  system  failed  to  afford  him  permanent 
comfort.  With  growing  intelligence  he  became 
more  and  more  repelled  by  the  childish  elements 
in  Mani's  mythology,  and  at  the  same  time 
the  mechanical  dualism  of  the  creed  deceived 
for  a  while  but  could  not  long  satisfy  his  real 
spiritual  needs.  The  Hindu  attributed  the 
condition  of  good  and  evil  to  the  upward  or 
6 


82  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

downward  inclination  of  the  whole  character 
of  a  man,  and  in  that  faith  if  anywhere  it  might 
be  said:  Thou  art  thyself  thy  proper  heaven 
and  hell.  The  conflict  may  have  been  sym- 
bolised by  the  claims  of  spirit  and  matter,  but 
essentially  it  pertained  to  the  man's  own  will 
and  intelligence,  and  upon  himself  alone  lay 
the  duty  and  responsibility  of  turning  from 
his  own  lower  desires  to  his  higher  liberty. 
Mani,  indeed,  had  gone  half  way  toward  this 
conception  of  evil.  In  the  Persian  m5rthology 
from  which  he  started,  Ahriman  opposed  the 
god  of  light  at  every  point,  to  be  sure;  yet 
creation  was  primarily  good,  and  the  evil  works 
of  Ahriman  are  a  later  corruption.  According 
to  the  Bundahish  the  original  man  and  woman 
first  believed  that  the  world  was  created  by 
Ormazd,  and  afterwards  came  to  believe  Ahri- 
man was  the  creator.  From  this  falsehood 
Ahriman  received  his  first  joy,  and  for  this 
falsehood  their  souls  shall  remain  in  hell  even 
unto  the  resurrection.  The  material  world  is 
essentially  righteous;  and  it  is  the  first  duty  of 
man  to  support  asha,  the  existing  order  of 
things,  against  the  assaults  of  the  demons. 
Now  the  struggle  between  Mani's  god  of  light 
and  Eblis,  whether  from  Hindu  influences  or 
not,  becomes  more  intimate  and  far-reaching 
than  this.  The  contest  is  no  longer  carried  on 
in  a  neutral  region  as  between  two  armies  in 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  83 

battle  array,  but  is  waged  in  every  particle 
of  creation  between  the  two  natures  contained 
within  it.  But  Mani  never  quite  reached  the 
higher  meaning  of  this  combat  as  seen  by  the 
Hindus;  with  him  the  symbol  of  spirit  and 
flesh  was  the  reality,  and  evil  thus  lost  its 
intrinsic  seriousness.  Theoretically,  and  to  a 
certain  degree  actually,  his  dualism,  like  that 
of  the  Hindu,  was  within  man,  but  it  took 
the  form  of  a  mechanical  mixture  of  elements 
rather  than  of  a  conflict  of  tendencies  involving 
the  whole  being.  In  effect  the  man  himself 
was  the  spiritual  element,  and  his  end  was 
merely  to  free  himself,  by  more  or  less  physical 
means,  from  the  envelope  of  the  body.  It  was 
this  slurring  over  of  the  true  nature  of  evil,  by 
transferring  it  from  the  conscience  to  the  imagi- 
nation, that  in  the  end  repelled  Augustine. 
"For  up  to  this  time,"  he  says,  speaking  of  his 
Manichaean  days,  "  it  seemed  to  me  that  not  we 
ourselves  committed  sin,  but  I  know  not  what 
alien  nature  within  us;  and  it  gratified  my 
pride  to  be  without  blame," 

In  this  state  of  mind,  doubting  the  veracity 
of  Manichseism,  but  without  any  settled  belief 
to  take  its  place,  he  sailed  in  his  thirtieth  year 
to  Italy,  for  the  purpose  of  bettering  himself 
in  his  profession.  He  had  with  him  his  friend 
Alypius  and  the  concubine  with  whom,  almost 
to  his  conversion,  he  lived  in  good  faith,  and 


84  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

who  was  the  mother  of  his  son  Adeodatus.  He 
was  followed  also  by  his  devoted  mother.  For  a 
while  he  lived  at  Rome,  and  then  went  as  a 
teacher  of  rhetoric^  to  Milan,  the  seat  of  the 
great  Bishop  Ambrose. 

Here  the  first  enlightenment  came  to  him 
from  the  Neo-Platonic  philosophy  as  it  was  inter- 
preted in  the  works  of  Victorinus  and  other 
Latin  writers.  There  is  much  in  the  Enneads  of 
Plotinus  to  make  the  transition  from  Manichae- 
ism  easy.  In  that  mystic  philosophy  the  soul 
of  the  world  is  portrayed  as  bound  in  the  chains 
of  the  flesh  and  aspiring  to  escape;  "our  father- 
land is  there  whence  we  have  come,  and  our 

1  In  his  profession  Augustine  seems  to  have  been 
only  moderately  successful.  As  a  writer  his  work  is 
marred  by  his  habit  of  dictation  to  a  notarius,  or  short- 
hand secretary,  and  by  the  impatience  of  his  nature. 
His  language  flows  too  broadly  and  is  further  dis- 
figured by  an  inveterate  taste  for  verbal  quibbles. 
As  a  stylist  he  ranks  below  his  contemporary  Jerome, 
yet  at  his  best  he  has  command  of  the  telling  phrase 
and  of  a  vivid  personal  eloquence.  He  knew  the 
allurement  of  words,  verba  quasi  vasa  electa  atque 
pretiosa;  and  such  a  passage  as  the  opening  of  chapter  ii., 
book  ii.,  of  the  Confessions  is  notable  in  the  history  of 
eloquence : 

"Et  quid  erat,  quod  me  delectabat,  nisi  amare  et 
amari?  Sed  non  tenebatur  modus  ab  animo  usque  ad 
animum,  quatenus  est  luminosus  limes  amicitus;  sed 
exhalabantur  nebulae  de  limosa  concupiscentia  carnis, 
et  scatebra  pubertatis,  et  obnubilabant  atque  obfus- 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  85 

father  is  there,"  said  Plotinus;  and  virtue  is 
a  flight  from  the  death  of  the  world,  from 
the  awua-arJMa,  But  in  place  of  the  crude 
antinomy  of  two  equal  independent  powers, 
the  deity  now  becomes  the  supreme  being  and 
evil  is  mere  distance  from  him,  an  ever-lessening 
participation  in  his  infinite  essence.  It  is 
Plato's  theory  of  the  one  and  the  many,  of 
noumena  and  phenomena,  brought  halfway,  but 
only  halfway,  to  a  religious  myth.  And  in 
what  may  be  called  his  philosophy  of  religion 
Augustine  never  departed  from  these  views; 
they  may  be  found  developed  at  length  in  his 
De  Civitate  Dei,  written  when  his  doctrine  had 

cabant  cor  meum,  ut  non  discerneretur  serenitas  di- 
lectionis  a  caligine  libidinis.  Utrumque  in  confuso 
asstuabat,  et  rapiebat  imbecillam  astatem  per  abrupta 
cupiditatum,  atque  mersabat  gurgite  flagitiorum.  In- 
valuerat  super  me  ira  tua,  et  nesciebam.  Obsurdue- 
ram  stridore  catenas  mortalitatis  meae,  poena  superbiae 
anim£e  meae:  et  ibam  longius  a  te,  et  sinebas:  et 
iactabar,  et  efEundebar,  et  diffluebam,  et  ebuUiebam 
per  fornicationes  meas,  et  tacebas.  O  tardum  gaudium 
meum!  Tacebas  tunc,  et  ego  ibam  porro  longe  a  te,  in 
plura  et  plura  sterilia  semina  dolorum,  superba.  de- 
iectione  et  inquieta  lassitudine.  " 

In  this  emotional  psychology,  at  once  subtle  and 
intense,  Augustine  is  the  father  of  modern  literature, 
and  he  has  never  been  surpassed.  Nor  is  it  difficult 
to  foresee  in  the  sudden  penetrating  quality  of  such 
phrases  as  I  have  marked  by  underscoring  the  course 
of  romantic  rhetoric. 


86  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Stiffened  into  its  final  form.  Since  God,  he 
there  says,  is  essential  being  and  immutable, 
to  those  things  which  he  created  ex  nihilo  he 
gave  being,  but  not  the  highest  being  equal 
to  his  own.  The  dualism  of  nature  is  thus 
reduced  to  being  and  not-being,  esse  and  nihil, 
and  the  world  is,  so  to  speak,  a  mixture  of  these 
two.  Evil  is  a  self- withdrawing  from  the 
supreme  being  toward  not-being;  the  summum 
bonum  is  eternal  life,  the  summum  malum 
eternal  death.  Almost  at  times  Augustine 
represents  the  punishment  of  the  wicked  as  a 
gradual  annihilation. 

But  with  Augustine  intellectual  enlighten- 
ment was  still  something  far  removed  from  re- 
ligious conviction.  Now,  as  always  throughout 
his  life,  substantially,  if  not  temporally,  fides 
prcBcedit  intellectum;  and  faith,  having  once  aban- 
doned him,  was  slow  to  return.  This,  appar- 
ently, was  his  period  of  greatest  mental  anguish, 
while  his  spirit  lay,  as  it  were,  groaning  for  the 
new  birth.  And  the  change  came  at  last,  as 
these  changes  are  wont  to  come,  instantly  and 
miraculously.  The  story  of  his  conversion  is 
the  most  famous  in  Christendom  after  St.  Paul's, 
but  his  telling  of  it  in  the  Confessions  is  for  ever 
fresh.  He  had  taken  to  reading  the  Scripture 
earnestly,  but  still  hung  back  trembling  from 
the  abyss  of  self-surrender:  "All  my  argu- 
ments   were    undone;    there    remained    but    a 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  87 

speechless  terror,  for  my  soul  dreaded  as  death 
itself  to  be  taken  from  its  customary  stream 
which  was  bearing  it  to  death. "  In  this  mood 
he  went  one  day,  with  his  faithful  friend  Alypius, 
out  into  the  garden,  determined  now  or  never 
to  silence  the  cry  in  his  heart  ^ : 

Thus  was  I  sick  at  heart  and  in  torment,  accusing 
myself  more  bitterly  than  ever,  tossing  and  turning  in 
the  frail  bond  that  still  held  me,  until  it  should  break 
asunder;  frail  it  was,  yet  it  held  me  still.  .  .  .  But 
when  profound  reflection  had  drawn  my  whole  misery 
from  its  secret  depths,  and  heaped  it  up  in  the  sight  of 
my  heart,  there  came  a  great  storm  with  mighty  shower 
of  tears.  And,  that  I  might  pour  it  all  forth  with  fitting 
words,  I  rose  to  depart  from  Alypius.  It  seemed  to 
me  that  solitude  was  more  fitting  for  my  tears.  And 
I  went  further  apart,  so  that  even  his  presence  would 
no  longer  be  a  burden  to  me.  ...  I  flung  myself 
beneath  a  certain  fig-tree,  and  gave  the  rein  to  my 
tears ;  and  the  floods  burst  forth  from  my  eyes,  an  accep- 
table sacrifice  to  Thee.  And  many  things  I  said  to 
Thee  in  this  sense,  though  not  in  these  words:  "And 
Thou,  Lord,  how  long  wilt  Thou  delay?  Wilt  Thou  be 
angry  for  ever,  Lord?  Be  not  mindful  of  my  earlier 
iniquity."  For  I  felt  I  was  hampered  by  it.  I  poured 
out  words  of  misery:  "How  long?  How  long?  To- 
morrow, and  to-morrow  ?  Why  not  now  ?  Why  not  end 
my  baseness  this  very  hour?" 

And,  speaking  thus,  I  wept  with  a  most  bitter 
contrition  in  my  heart.     And  suddenly  I  heard  from 

'  The  translation  that  follows  is  from  Joseph  Mc- 
Cabe's  brilliant  but,  psychologically,  unsatisfactory  St. 
Augustine  and  His  Age. 


88  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

a  neighbouring  house  the  voice,  as  it  were,  of  a  boy  or 
girl  singing  many  times:  "Take  up  and  read,  take  up 
and  read."  (Tolle,  lege;tolle,  lege.)  I  was  roused  im- 
mediately, and  began  to  think  intently  whether 
children  were  wont  to  sing  this  in  any  game  of  theirs ;  but 
I  could  not  recollect  ever  to  have  heard  it.  And, 
checking  the  flood  of  my  tears,  I  arose,  thinking  no 
other  than  that  it  was  a  Divine  command  to  me  to 
open  the  sacred  volume  and  read  the  first  chapter  I 
lighted  on.  .  .  .  Thus  admonished,  I  returned  to  the 
spot  where  Alypius  sat;  for  I  had  placed  the  volume 
of  the  Apostle  there  when  I  had  left.  I  grasped  and 
opened  it,  and  read  in  silence  the  chapter  which  first 
met  my  eyes:  "Not  in  rioting  and  drunkenness,  not 
in  chambering  and  wantonness,  not  in  strife  and 
envying.  But  put  ye  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and 
make  not  provision  for  the  flesh,  to  fulfil  the  lusts 
thereof. "  I  neither  wished  nor  needed  to  read  more. 
For  with  the  close  of  this  sentence  the  darkness  of  my 
doubt  melted  away,  as  though  a  strong  light  had  shone 
upon  my  heart.  Then,  inserting  my  finger  or  some 
other  mark,  I  closed  the  book,  and  with  a  tranquil 
mind  handed  it  to  Alypius. 

The  first  thought  on  reading  this  celebrated 
scene  is  likely  to  be  a  feeling  of  irrelevancy 
between  the  particular  message  found  by 
Augustine  and  his  moral  condition.  He  was 
at  that  time  as  far  removed  from  rioting  and 
drunkenness  as  ever  in  his  later  days  of  saintli- 
ness;  his  whole  strength  was  absorbed  in  spirit- 
ual conflict.  Yet  in  a  more  general  way  the 
text  did  come  home  to  his  inmost  need.  It 
summoned    him  from  the  intellectual  consider- 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  89 

ation  of  evil  as  a  negation  of  good  to  the  con- 
viction of  sin  as  something  for  which  he  was 
morally  and  terribly  responsible;  while,  at  the 
same  time,  it  presented  the  metaphysical  theo- 
rem of  being  and  not-being  in  the  form  of  a  con- 
crete dualism,  God  and  his  own  soul.  Thus  faith 
allied  itself  to  the  insatiable  craving  of  his 
heart  for  a  personal  relation.  God  was  still 
the  supreme  being,  but  being  became  identified 
emotionally,  if  not  logically,  with  personal 
volition;  evil  was  the  deliberate  setting  apart 
of  the  human  will  from  the  divine  will,  the 
voluntary  separation  of  the  soul  from  the  source 
of  life.  About  this  time  he  wrote  his  Soliloquies, 
wherein  his  new  conception  of  the  inevitable 
dualism  of  life  is  summed  up  in  the  question 
and  answer:  "Deum  et  animam  scire  cupio. — 
Nihilne  plus? — Nihil  omnino."  In  this  chasm 
between  the  human  and  the  divine  personalities 
his  one  hope  of  reconciliation  sprang  from  the 
realisation  of  Christ  as  the  mediator,  for  as  in 
Christ  we  see  God  become  man  without  losing  his 
divinity,  so  there  was  hope  that  man  might 
be  lifted  up  with  him  to  God,  yet  without 
losing  his  humanity.  The  idea  is  developed  in 
a  notable  passage  of  the  De  Civitate: 

But  because  the  mind  itself,  which  naturally  possesses 
reason  and  intelligence  [for  comprehending  God], 
has  been  by  certain  dark  and  inveterate  vices  made 
incapable  of  dwelling  joyously  in  the  incommutable 


90  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

light  or  even  of  enduring  that  Hght,  until  by  daily 
renewal  and  healing  it  becomes  equal  to  so  great 
felicity,  therefore  it  was  first  to  be  imbued  and  purged 
with  faith.  And  that  in  this  faith  it  might  more 
confidently  journey  toward  the  truth,  the  truth  itself, 
God,  the  son  of  God,  becoming  man  yet  not  ceasing  to 
be  God,  constituted  and  founded  this  faith,  that  there 
might  be  a  way  for  man  to  God  through  the  man-God. 
For  such  is  the  mediator  between  God  and  men,  the 
man  Christ  Jesus.  For  in  this  he  is  the  mediator,  in 
that  he  is  man;  and  in  this  he  is  the  way.  Now  if 
between  the  one  who  tends  and  that  to  which  he  tends 
there  be  a  mediating  way  (via  media),  there  is  hope  of 
arriving  at  the  end;  but  if  the  way  be  lacking,  or  if 
we  are  ignorant  how  to  go,  what  profits  it  to  know 
whither  we  are  to  go?  One  only  way  is  there  entirely 
guarded  against  all  errors,  that  the  same  person  be 
God  and  man:  whither  we  go,  God;  how  we  go,  man. 

Thus,  by  another  fiction  of  mythology,  the  dual- 
ism which  had  been  transferred  from  the 
soul  of  man  to  an  external  opposition  of  the 
soul  and  God  was  restored  to  the  union  of  two 
natures  within  the  single  person  of  the  God- 
man.  By  the  mystery  of  the  atonement  man 
was  to  be  made  one  with  the  mediator  and  so 
brought  back  to  union  with  God.  All  this 
Augustine  heard  implicitly  in  the  oracle  that 
spoke  to  him  through  the  words  of  St.  Paul  in 
the  garden  at  Milan :  "  Put  ye  on  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ."  His  philosophy  was  again  made 
religion. 

The   period   immediately   following   his  con- 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE 


91 


version  was,  in  appearance  at  least,  the  happiest 
of  his  life.  He  had  found  that  peace  of  God 
after  which  his  soul  panted,  and  as  yet  his  faith 
was  a  pure  uplifting  of  the  heart,  untroubled 
by  the  fierce  disputes  with  heresy  that  occupied 
his  later  years.  For  a  while  he  retired  with 
his  mother  and  Alypius  to  the  villa  of  a  friend 
at  Cassiciacum,  where  they  passed  the  days 
in  reading  and  writing  and  in  discussing  end- 
lessly the  new-found  truth.  But  already  he 
was  aflame  "  to  rehearse  the  glory  of  the  Psalms 
throughout  the  whole  world,  against  the  pride 
of  the  human  race."  Home  and  duty  called  to 
Africa,  and  thither  he  returned  in  the  year  388. 
Three  years  later  he  was  forcibly  made  a  pres- 
byter, and  in  395  he  became  Bishop  of  Hippo. 
The  remaining  thirty-five  years  of  his  life  fall 
into  three  overlapping  periods,  as  he  was  en- 
gaged successively  with  the  three  arch-enemies 
of  orthodoxy.  His  first  ambition  was  to 
smite  the  Manichaeans,  against  whom  he  bore 
the  grudge  of  a  renegade.  In  the  long  treat- 
ises and  letters  and  debates  that  he  poured 
out  against  that  religion  one  perceives  how 
great  was  the  danger  escaped,  and  how  the 
Christian  world  shook  off  the  foe  only  by  assim- 
ilating a  good  deal  of  its  spirit.  Then  came  the 
controversy  with  the  Donatists,  a  dull-seeming 
question  to-day,  but  important  in  Augustine's 
development   as   forcing   him   to  crystallise  his 


92  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

views  in  regard  to  the  sacramentarian  office  of 
the  Church.  He  learned  more  clearly  the  value 
of  that  act  of  faith  by  which  the  communicant 
in  the  bread  and  wine  of  the  eucharist  was 
supposed  to  receive  the  body  and  blood  of 
Christ  and  so  to  be  lifted  into  a  real  participa- 
tion in  the  eternal  life  of  the  God-man.  Thus, 
through  the  sacraments,  there  was  permitted  to 
enter  that  saving  grace  of  the  imagination,  where- 
by the  believer  (it  was  not  wholly  discarded 
even  by  Calvin,  cf.  Instiiutio  Christiance  Re- 
ligionis,  IV.  xvii.  5-19)  might  escape  the  hard 
element  of  rationalism  that  tends  to  petrify 
the  definitions  of  dogma,  and  might  live  the 
pure  life  of  the  spirit  within  the  fold  of  the 
Church.  We  must  never  forget,  in  dealing 
with  Christianity,  the  potential  nullifying  power 
of  this  faculty,  and  it  is  fair  always  to  remember 
that  the  strong  distaste  of  the  English  mind 
for  logical  conclusions  enabled,  and  still  enables, 
the  Church  of  that  country  at  its  best  to  open 
a  door  through  the  walls  of  superstition  and 
rationalism  into  the  garden  of  liberty  planted 
and  watered  by  the  spiritual  imagination.  Out 
of  that  controversy  arose  also  St.  Augustine's 
magnificent  vision  of  the  two  contrasted  cities 
of  the  world  and  of  God.  Not  many  scholars 
to-day  have  the  time  and  patience  to  explore 
the  immense  book  in  which  he  unfolded  that 
vision;  it  is,  in  fact,  largely  unrewarding  to  the 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  93 

reader.  Yet  its  very  conception  shows  how- 
radical  the  sense  of  dualism  was  in  Augustine's 
mind  and  how  the  Manichaean  conception  of  two 
eternally  hostile  powers  was  carried  over  into 
the  contrasted  kingdoms  of  heaven  and  of 
earth.  The  book  contains,  also,  strange  hints 
of  modern  literature  and  philosophy,  as  in  the 
famous  anticipation  (xi.  26)  of  the  Cartesian 
cogito  ergo  sum;  and  here  and  there  it  rises  to  a 
peculiar  eloquence,  as  in  book  xix.,  chapter  17, 
where  the  earthly  peace  and  the  celestial  peace 
are  defined,  and  where  it  is  shown  how  the 
celestial  city  during  its  peregrination  in  this 
world  makes  use  of  the  earthly  peace  {utitur 
ergo  etiam  ccelestis  civitas  in  hac  sua  peregrinatione 
pace  terrena). 

The  last  contest  with  heresy  is  far  the  most 
important,  for  it  was  the  creed  of  Augustine  as 
defined  and  hardened  by  his  debate  with  the 
Pelagians  that  formulated  Christianity  for  the 
Middle  Ages  and,  despite  our  protests,  for  us 
of  to-day  if  we  would  preserve  its  force.  That 
debate  may  seem  academic,  but  in  reality  it 
touched  the  very  quick  of  Augustine's  faith. 
He  had  reached  his  present  position  by  a  series 
of  steps  which  led  him  at  last  to  a  belief  in 
harmony  with  the  deepest  instincts  of  his  soul. 
Starting  with  an  intense  consciousness  of  the 
division  of  life  against  itself,  he  had  first  fallen 
under  the  sway  of  Mani's  imaginative  mythology. 


94  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Mani  had  altered  the  Persian  dualism  of  two  ex- 
ternal powers  into  a  combat  within  man  himself 
of  two  temporarily  united  but  radically  distinct 
natures.  Seeing  the  mechanical  insufficiency 
of  this  system,  Augustine  had  passed  to  the 
Neo-Platonic  idea  of  evil  as  a  partial  participa- 
tion in,  or  negation  of,  the  supreme  infinite  good. 
But  still  the  craving  of  his  heart  was  not  satisfied. 
Abstract  ideas  meant  little  to  him;  personal 
relationship  was  all  in  all.  This  was  the  point 
on  which  his  conversion  turned:  God's  will 
became  the  supreme  being;  man's  will,  in  so  far 
as  it  differentiated  itself  from  God's,  the  volun- 
tary inclination  to  not-being.  He  now  had  a 
dualism  of  two  personalities,  God  and  man; 
the  tincture  of  Manichaeism  that  remained 
with  him,  or,  more  exactly,  the  imperative 
conviction  of  sin  that  had  made  him  a  disciple 
of  Manichaeism,  now  came  to  array  these  two 
personalities  against  each  other  as  completely 
hostile  forces — God  infinitely  good,  man  totally 
depraved  by  the  very  definition  of  his  finiteness, 
nay,  rather  infinitely  evil  as  tending  to  absolute 
death.  To  be  sure  his  conception  of  God  as 
all -responsible  creator  compelled  him  to  believe 
that  man  was  originally  created  a  free  will 
perfectly  good  in  the  image  of  God,  and  that  the 
evil  of  his  nature  was  to  be  explained  by  that 
nwnstrum,  his  voluntary  secession  from  God. 
But  this  was,  so  to  speak,  the  background  of 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  95 

his  creed,  a  matter  of  revelation  and  not  of 
present  consciousness.  As  he  saw  the  actual 
world,  it  existed  apart  from  God  and  lost  in 
depravity;  the  very  assumption  of  free  will 
meant  a  division  from  this  infinite  will,  and 
consequently  sin.  The  evil  of  man  depends 
therefore  not  on  particular  deeds,  but  is  the 
essence  of  his  personality ;  he  is  totally  depraved 
is  so  far  as  his  personality  is  a  total  indivisible 
entity.  To  look  upon  a  man's  acts  as  partly 
good  and  partly  evil  is  to  disregard  Augustine's 
fundamental  conception  of  a  dualism  of  person- 
alities. Salvation  cannot  result  from  a  mere 
predominance  of  good  or  from  a  gradual  growth 
in  virtue;  but  must  spring  from  a  total  change 
of  a  man's  nature  into  conformity  to  the  divine 
nature.  It  is  a  self-surrender  which  cannot  be 
volitional,  because  volition  is  the  essence  of 
self  and  of  sin.  It  must  proceed  from  a  miracu- 
lous power  outside  of  man,  by  the  outstretched 
arm  of  God.  Conversion  is  the  result  of  God's 
free  Grace  working  miraculously  upon  the  soul, 
and  comes  to  us  with  no  choice  or  foresight 
of  our  own. 

Now  just  here  entered  the  dispute  with 
Pelagius.  That  Irish  forefather  of  Jesuitism 
sought  to  comfort  mankind  by  slurring  over 
the  gulf  between  the  human  and  the  divine. 
Evil  does  not  pertain  to  the  whole  character 
of  man,  but  to  his  separate  acts,  and  salvation 


96  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

lies  within  the  reach  of  all  who  choose  to  practise 
righteousness.  Conversion  is  chiefly  the  work 
of  man  and  not  of  God,  and  loses  its  significance 
as  a  total  change  of  character.  For  nature, 
he  taught,  is  essentially  good  as  it  came  from 
the  hand  of  the  Creator,  and  still  so  remains. 
Adam's  error  affected  himself  alone  and  was  not 
transmitted  to  posterity;  the  child  is  therefore 
born  uncorrupted,  with  natural  and  ineradicable 
impulses  for  good,  which  can  be  perverted  only 
by  an  act  of  the  will  deliberately  contrary  to 
reason.  Amid  the  temptations  of  the  flesh 
and  the  seductions  of  the  world,  God's  grace 
and  the  example  of  Christ  come  to  fortify  the 
nature  of  man  and  assist  him  in  his  tenure  of 
inborn  righteousness.  Pelagianism  thus  pre- 
tends to  save  for  man  his  freedom,  but  essentially 
is  a  denial  of  free  will,  in  so  far  as  free  will 
implies  a  radical  separation  from  a  transcendent 
God.  The  position  of  Pelagius  is,  it  must  be 
acknowledged,  intrinsically  illogical.  If  the  in- 
finite, as  with  the  Hindus,  lies  within  man's 
own  nature,  then  conversion  may  be  a  voluntary, 
however  mysterious,  act  of  the  man  himself 
by  which  his  own  true  being  frees  itself  from 
finite  illusion.  But  if  the  division  is  between 
an  infinite  divine  will  and  a  finite  human -will, 
in  what  way  shall  the  lower  term  raise  itself  to 
the  higher?  Augustine  perceived  that  here 
was  a  denial  of  sin  as  something  of  vast  moment 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  97 

("  hominem  posse  esse  sine  peccato  et  mandata 
Dei  facile  custodire,  si  velit"),  a  denial,  in  effect, 
of  that  very  consciousness  of  an  absolute  dual- 
ism of  infinite  and  finite  upon  which  the  reality 
of  religion  rests.  In  the  end  it  could  mean 
only  this,  that  humanity  in  its  finite  nature 
was  to  be  made  all-sufficient  and  the  idea  of 
God  was  to  be  lost  from  the  world.  Augustine 
saw  this,  and  he  saw  the  truth. 

Such  is  the  religion  that  St.  Augustine,  like 
an  avenger  of  the  African  queen,  forced  upon 
the  unwilling  Roman  world,  for  Rome  of  herself 
inclined  always  to  the  Aristotelian  and  Pelagian 
compromise  which  shirked  logic  for  virtuous 
expediency.  In  the  creation  of  dogma,  indeed, 
he  accomplished  but  little ;  this  work  was  pretty 
well  finished  before  his  day.  But  the  intensity 
of  his  emotional  nature  endued  with  living  force 
what  the  Greek  theologians  had  left  as  a  some- 
what scholastic  theory.  His  dominant  person- 
ality imposed  itself  readily  on  a  religion  that 
was  so  purely  personal  in  its  character.  Out 
of  that  sublime  contrast  of  the  soul  of  man  set 
over  against  an  infinite  God  arose  what  has  been 
called  the  anguish  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  also 
their  rapture  of  joy.  Neither  is  there  for  us, 
so  far  as  we  are  Christians,  any  candid  escape 
from  the  rigour  of  his  orthodoxy.  Grant  this 
dualism  of  the  human  and  the  divine  persons, 
call  it,  if  you  will,  by  the  euphemistic  title  of 


98  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  fatherhood  of  God, — and  what  else  but  this 
is  Christianity? — and  you  identify  true  religion 
with  the  fervid  uncompromising  faith  of  the 
Bishop  of  Hippo.  The  last  great  crisis  of 
Christianity  was  that  revival  of  Augustine's 
battle  with  Pelagius  in  the  contest  between 
the  Jansenists  and  the  Jesuits.  When  the 
Pelagianism  of  the  Jesuits  won  the  day,  it  was 
in  reality  a  fatal  blow  to  the  old  faith;  and  the 
fall  of  Port-Royal  was  the  fall  of  the  Church  as 
the  custodian  of  the  true  faith — actum  est. 
We  are  all  Pelagians  to-day,  and  our  end,  unless 
some  incalculable  force  changes  the  current, 
may  be  foreseen  in  the  present  tendency  to 
substitute  a  so-called  Christian  sociology  for 
theology.  And  sociology  has  no  need  of  the  hy- 
pothesis of  a  God ;  it  has  no  care  to  go  beyond 
the  second  commandment:  Thou  shalt  love 
thy  neighbour  as  thyself.  We  are  all  Pelagians  ? 
Let  us  rather  say,  with  the  late  Marquis  of 
Salisbury,  we  are  all  Socialists. 

Yet  a  word  in  conclusion.  Though  there  is 
a  logical  correctness  in  Augustine's  main  syllo- 
gism, one  cannot  read  much  in  his  works  without 
discovering  whole  tracts  of  thought  and  ex- 
hortation that  refuse  to  take  their  place  in  his 
dogmatic  system;  one  finds  that  in  his  practical 
doctrine  he  builds  upon  what  may  be  called 
the  logic  of  emotions  rather  than  upon  pure 
reason,   and   constantly  calls  upon  sinners   to 


SAINT  AUGUSTINE  99 

repent,  as  if  salvation  were  in  their  own  hands. 
And  it  is  in  a  line  with  his  personal  theology 
that  the  appeal  to  man  should  be  to  choose, 
not  between  the  absence  and  the  presence  of  de- 
sire, but  between  good  and  evil  desire.  "  There 
is  will,"  he  says,  "in  all  men:  or  rather,  all  men 
are  nothing  other  than  wills.  For  what  is 
desire  and  joy,  but  a  will  of  consent  toward  the 
things  we  wish?  and  what  is  fear  and  sadness 
but  a  will  of  dissent  from  the  things  we  do  not 
wish?"  And  as  desire  is  thus  the  basis  of  our 
will  and  of  our  nature,  so  it  is  the  cause  of 
that  division  into  the  cities  of  good  and  of  evil: 
"  Fecerunt  itaque  civitates  duas  amores  duo — thus 
are  the  two  cities  made  by  two  loves ;  the  earthly 
city  by  the  love  of  self  even  to  the  contempt 
of  God,  the  celestial  by  the  love  of  God  even  to 
contempt  of  self. "  The  whole  matter  is  summed 
up  in  that  most  beautiful  of  his  aphorisms: 
**  Unde  mihi  videtur,  quod  definitio  brevis  et 
vera  virtutis,  Ordo  est  amoris." 

If  there  is  thus  in  the  paradox  of  absolute 
Grace  and  free  will  a  Kantian  failure  to  har- 
monise rational  and  practical  theology,  we  must 
remember  that  the  insoluble  difficulty  came 
to  St.  Augustine  from  the  very  sources  of 
Christianity.  The  fallacy  must  lie  in  his  prem- 
ises, and  one  seems  to  put  finger  upon  it  in 
that  primary  assumption  of  a  God  at  once 
personal    and    infinite,     which    was    accepted 


lOO  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

unreservedly  by  St.  Augustine  and  nominally 
by  Pelagius.  For,  after  all,  is  there  not  an 
irreconcilable  contradiction  in  the  very  terms 
of  the  definition?  Is  not  personality,  as  the 
expression  of  individual  desire  and  choice,  a 
negation  of  the  infinite,  whether  in  God  or 
man?  India  had  acknowledged  this  difficulty 
and  had  made  the  conversion  of  man  to  consist 
in  the  renunciation  of  personality  as  the  last 
illusion  of  the  mind.  Greece,  too,  had  caught 
glimpses  of  this  truth,  and  had  announced  it 
in  her  own  suaver  and  more  flexible  speech; 
and  the  Christian  Platonists  of  the  Middle 
Ages  and  the  Renaissance,^  feeling  the  difficulty, 
veiled  their  mysticism  in  many  words. 

"  In  the  first  of  Henry  More's  Divine  Dialogues 
Hylobares  will  be  found  arguing  against  the  existence 
of  God  because  of  the  incomprehensibility  of  the 
attributes  of  eternity,  immutability,  omnisciency, 
spirituality,  and  omnipresency.  In  the  answers  of 
Philotheus  all  that  Christian  Platonism  can  say  to 
reconcile  personahty  with  these  qualities  is  developed 
at  length. 


PASCAL 

No  one  to-day  can  sit  down  to  write  on 
Pascal  without  feeling  that  the  third  book  of 
Sainte-Beuve's  Port-Royal  contains  about  every- 
thing there  is  profitable  to  say  on  the  subject.  ^ 
Were  it  not  that  his  is  one  of  the  cardinal  names 
in  the  history  of  religious  dualism,  certainly  I  at 
least  would  not  intrude  in  that  field.  And  to  be- 
gin with,  no  better  approach  to  Pascal,  the  vic- 
torious saint,  can  be  conceived  than  by  means  of 
that  dialogue  in  which  the  new  convert,  under 
the  probing  questions  of  his  spiritual  director, 
lays  bare  his  philosophical  relations  to  Epictetus 
and  Montaigne.  That  confession  may  lack 
the  artistic  perfection  of  Socrates'  talks  with 
the  young  men  of  Athens,  but  it  has  one,  and 
that  not  the  least,  grace  of  the  Platonic  dialogues 
— the  lucidity  that  brings  down  the  most  far- 
reaching   thoughts   to   the   level   of   our   daily 

»  Attention  should  be  called  to  F.  Strowski's  Pascal 
et  son  temps,  the  third  and  concluding  volume  of  which 
has  just  been  issued.  He  discusses  the  religious  ideas 
of  the  age  with  admirable  fulness  and  perspicuity.  But 
the  human  interest  is  with  Sainte-Beuve. 

lOI 


I02  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

conversation.  It  was  a  grace  that  never  failed 
Pascal,  proving  that  ideas  were  to  him,  as  to  all 
the  family  of  Plato,  living  things  and  not  the 
bodiless  words  of  the  schools,  and  demonstrating 
anew  that  philosophy  expresses  the  pure  love 
of  truth  only  so  long  as  it  remains  untechnical. 
Blaise  Pascal,  though  at  this  time  he  could 
scarcely  have  passed  his  thirty-third  year, 
already  enjoyed  a  considerable  reputation  for 
scientific  achievement  and  possessed  the  ex- 
perience of  a  man  of  the  world.  He  was  bom 
19  June,  1623,  at  Clermont-Ferrand,  of  an 
ancient  family  of  Auvergne  belonging  to  the 
noblesse  de  robe.  An  older  sister  married  a  M. 
Perier,  but  retained  always  her  close  relations 
with  the  Pascals,  father  and  son.  A  younger 
sister,  Jacqueline,  after  various  trials  took  the 
veil  at  Port- Royal  and  was  active  in  bringing 
her  brother  into  a  closer  association  with  the 
remarkable  body  of  priests  and  scholars  who 
formed  the  outlying  guard,  so  to  speak,  of  the 
convent.  But  the  education  of  Blaise  was  at 
first  little  concerned  with  religion.  His  father, 
himself  immersed  in  the  scientific  renaissance 
which  was  remoulding  the  very  basis  of  civilisa- 
tion, planned  for  the  lad  a  systematic  training 
whose  rigour  and  originality  can  be  likened  only 
to  the  discipline  of  John  Stuart  Mill.  To  this 
end  he,  in  1631,  sold  his  government  charge 
at  Clermont,  and  removed  his  family  to  Paris, 


PASCAL 


103 


where  he  joined  the  Conferences  ofPere  Mersenne 
out  of  which  was  to  grow  the  Academie  des 
Sciences.  That  busy  priest  of  the  Order  of 
the  Minims  fulfilled  an  office  with  which  there 
is  nothing  comparable  in  modern  times.  Not 
only  did  the  advanced  lights  of  Paris  meet 
regularly  at  his  chambers,  in  a  convent  near 
the  Palais  Royal,  to  discuss  the  mathematical 
and  physical  problems  of  the  day,  but  through 
the  visits  of  travelling  scholars  and  through 
his  enormous  correspondence  he  maintained 
what  may  be  called  a  scientific  clearing-house 
for  Europe.  Into  this  circle  Blaise  was  intro- 
duced when  little  more  than  a  child,  and  here 
he  came  into  touch  with  the  work  of  Galileo, 
Descartes,  Gassendi,  and  other  leaders  of 
thought,  not  to  mention  such  Englishmen  as 
Hobbes,  Kenelm  Digby,  Charles  Cavendish, 
and  Robert  Boyle.  The  story  of  his  own  early 
discoveries  is  one  of  the  parables  of  science. 
According  to  his  father's  scheme  mathematics 
were  not  to  be  taken  up  until  the  age  of  fifteen 
or  sixteen,  after  Latin  and  Greek  had  been 
mastered ;  but  at  the  age  of  twelve  he  was  found 
demonstrating  for  himself  the  proposition  of 
Euclid  which  proves  that  the  angles  of  a  triangle 
are  equal  to  two  right  angles.  There  was  no 
repressing  his  intellectual  passion  after  that. 
At  sixteen  he  is  at  work  upon  an  essay  on  conic 
sections.       In  1642  and   '43   he    is    busy    with 


I04  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

experiments  to  disprove  the  scholastic  notion  of 
nature's  horror  of  a  vacuum  and  to  show  that 
the  rise  of  mercury  in  a  tube  is  due  to  the  pres- 
sure of  the  air — experiments  which  roused  the 
always  irritable  jealousy  of  Descartes.  Other 
theories  and  inventions  followed,  including  the 
calculating  machine  which  was  perfected  in 
1652,  and  which  was  the  occasion  of  Pascal's 
letter  to  Queen  Christine  of  Sweden  on  the  two 
empires  of  civil  authority  and  of  science. 

But  our  concern  is  not  with  these  discover- 
ies. As  a  man  of  science  Pascal  would  be  re- 
membered as  one  among  many  contemporary 
investigators  of  the  second  rank;  as  a  spokes- 
man of  religious  experience  he  is  without  a 
peer  among  the  philosophers  of  the  Renaissance, 
standing  in  sharp  contrast  to  the  trend  of  the 
times  and  writing  words  that  can  never  lose 
their  meaning  or  their  freshness.  His  first 
conversion  took  place  in  1646.  In  January 
of  that  year  his  father,  living  then  at  Rouen, 
dislocated  his  hip  and  was  attended  by  two 
gentlemen  who  set  him  upon  reading  the  devo- 
tional works  of  Jansenius  and  of  his  disciples, 
Amauld  and  Saint-Cyran.  As  a  result  the 
family  was  converted  to  the  revived  doctrine 
of  St.  Augustine  which  was  then  beginning  to 
stir  the  Catholic  world  under  the  name  of  Jan- 
senism. It  cannot  be  said  that  the  change  was 
without  serious  effect  on  Blaise,  then  a  studious 


PASCAL  105 

young  man  of  twenty-three.  How  deeply  his 
conscience  was  stirred  may  be  seen  in  the 
beautiful  and  pathetic  Prayer,  written  about 
this  time,  To  Demand  of  God  the  Right  Usage 
of  Illness,  and  throughout  his  correspondence 
with  his  sisters,  particularly  in  the  long  letter 
(17  October,  1651)  On  the  Death  of  his  Father, 
wherein  the  spirit  of  religious  resignation  and 
the  dividing  mind  of  geometry  seem  to  have 
joined  hands.  All  this  is  indisputable,  but 
it  is  equally  true  that  his  conversion  was 
still  at  bottom  more  a  matter  of  the  intellect 
than  of  the  heart  and  will.  As  an  intel- 
lectual impulse  it  was  important  in  deter- 
mining the  character  of  the  real  regeneration 
when  this  came ;  meanwhile  it  left  him  in  a  state 
differing  only  in  degree  from  that  of  Bacon  and 
Descartes  and  those  others  who  shut  religion 
off  in  an  innocuous  sphere  by  itself,  separate 
from  philosophy  and  the  conduct  of  life.  Dur- 
ing all  this  time  he  was  intermittently  engaged 
in  scientific  pursuits,  and,  more  particularly, 
from  the  death  of  his  father  to  his  rebirth  he 
passed  through  what  has  been  called  his  worldly 
period — vie  mondaine.  There  is  no  suspicion 
of  immorality  in  his  case,  but  it  is  evident  that 
during  these  years  he  gave  himself  up  to  the 
guidance  of  his  friend  the  Due  de  Roannez, 
and  of  two  professed  sceptics  and  honnetes 
gens,  MM.  Mere  and  Miton,  who  laughed  him 


Io6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

out  of  his  bourgeois  pedantries  and  confirmed 
him  in  the  refinements  of  courtly  society.^  It 
is  a  plausible  guess  that  his  subtle,  but  rather 
scholastic,  Discours  sur  les  passions  de  Vamour, 
was  written  as  a  wager  among  these  friends; 
certainly  one  of  them,  M.  Miton,  remained  in 
his  memory  as  a  type  of  the  disillusioned  and 
detached  worldling  to  whom  the  prizes  of  life 
were  a  vanity  scarcely  worth  the  picking  up, 
and  who  had  thus  a  lasting  significance  for  him 
as  a  negative  counterpart  of  the  Christian. 

It  was,  in  fact,  through  feelings  akin  to  those 
of  M.  Miton  that  Pascal  was  led  to  the  supreme 
change.  There  is  evidence  that  the  emptiness 
of  his  pleasures,  or,  more  exactly,  the  discord 
between  his  religious  instinct  and  this  vanity 
of  his  pursuits,  troubled  him  more  and  more 
as  time  passed.     In  this  state  he  was  driven 

>  In  a  well-known  letter  Mer6  thus  wrote  of  honnetete, 
la  quintessence  de  toutes  les  vertus:  "Vous  ne  songez 
pas  qu'il  est  bien  rare  de  trouver  un  honnete  homme. 
J'ai  un  ami  qui  ferait  ce  voyage  des  Indes  pour  en 
voir  un  seulement.  Peut-etre  qu'il  est  trop  difficile, 
mais  il  m'assure  toujoursque  ce  n'est  qu'une  pure  idee, 
et  qu'on  n'en  voit  que  I'ombre  et  I'apparence.  Quoi 
qu'il  en  soit,  plus  on  approche  de  cette  idee,  plus  on  a 
de  merite,  et  les  meilleurs  esprits  des  siecles  passes 
demeurent  d'accord  que  c'est  en  cela  principalement 
que  la  felicity  consiste,  et  je  crois  qu'ils  jugent  bien. 
Car  il  est  impossible  d'  avoir  cette  honnetet6  sans  la 
connaitre,  ni  de  la  connaitre  sans  I'aimer  6perd^ment, 
et  c'est  ce  qui  fait  qu'on  est  heureux  de  la  poss6der." 


PASCAL 


107 


for  sympathy,  perhaps  also  for  enlightenment, 
to  his  sister  Jacqueline  who  had  become  a  nun 
at  Port- Royal,  and  in  September  of  1654  we 
find  her  writing  to  Mme.  P^rier  of  the  pity  his 
confession  caused  her.  A  little  later,  probably 
21  November,  while  on  a  visit  to  the  convent, 
he  was  powerfully  moved  by  a  sermon  of 
M.  Singlin  on  the  beginnings  of  the  Christian 
life,  which  seemed  to  him  to  be  directed  specially 
to  his  case.  Two  days  afterwards,  23  November, 
in  his  thirty-second  year,  he  felt  the  blow  of 
heaven.  From  about  half  past  ten  in  the  even- 
ing until  half  an  hour  after  midnight,  according 
to  his  own  precise  account,  he  was  rapt  into  a 
state  of  ecstasy,  from  which  he  awoke  as  a  new 
man.  After  his  death  there  was  found,  sewed 
in  the  lining  of  his  doublet,  a  bit  of  folded 
parchment  on  which  he  had  written  a  memorial 
of  this  experience,  and  within  the  parchment 
an  exact  copy  of  the  same  on  paper.  The 
parchment  has  disappeared,  but  the  paper 
is  still  preserved  at  the  Bibliotheque  Nationale, 
exposing  to  curious  eyes  by  a  kind  of  sacrilege 
the  series  of  almost  incoherent  ejaculations 
in  which  he  memorised  the  agony  of  a  soul 
astray  and  the  peace  (Certitude.  Certitude,  Sen- 
timent. Joie.  Paix.)  of  a  soul  that  has  found 
God.  It  is  dangerous  for  the  profane  critic 
to  meddle  with  these  conversions  of  the  saints, 
yet    they    challenge    investigation.     And    the 


Io8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

phenomenon  in  its  baser  forms  is  common 
enough.  Apparently  it  comes  with  some  crisis 
of  the  nervous  system,  often  caused  by  prolonged 
emotional  tension,  wherein  occurs  a  complete 
dissolution  of  that  hexis,  or  congeries  of  habits, 
which  makes  what  we  call  character.  It  seems 
to  a  man,  and  it  may  really  be,  that  at  a  cer- 
tain moment  of  time  there  is  an  escape  from 
the  close  limits  of  personality.  Too  often  the 
result  is  a  relaxation  which  leaves  the  so-called 
convert  a  prey  to  the  inrushing  animal  passions 
of  the  body.  But  because  the  immorality  of 
religious  revivals  is  so  well  known,  it  is  not  nec- 
essary to  deny  the  validity  of  the  true  and  rarer 
rebirth  which  is  attended  by  the  same,  or 
at  least  a  like-seeming,  physical  crisis.  When 
the  house  is  empty  and  garnished  either  the 
spirit  of  God  enters  in  or  seven  devils  take 
possession.  None  better  than  the  spiritual 
guides  of  Port- Royal  knew  the  ambiguity  of 
this  time  when  the  unsettling  of  habitual 
constraint  left  the  man  open  to  the  highest  and 
the  lowest  influences;  it  was  their  custom  to 
treat  would-be  converts  with  extreme  caution 
and  thoroughly  to  test  their  sincerity.  To 
Pascal  conversion,  it  is  evident,  meant  that 
religion,  which  had  been  chiefly  a  matter  of  the 
intellect,  suddenly  and  overwhelmingly  seized 
upon  his  heart  and  will ;  and  that ,  from  being  an 
interest  apart  from  life,  it  became  henceforth 


PASCAL 


log 


the  whole  of  life.  Consent  had  miraculously 
blossomed  into  faith.  His  affiliations  were 
with  the  school  of  Jansenism,  and  in  January 
of  1655  he  took  refuge  from  the  world  in  a  cell 
outside  the  walls  of  Port-Royal-des-Champs, 
with  the  little  band  of  solitaires  who  had  been 
first  brought  together  by  the  genius  of  the 
Abbe  de  Saint-Cyran.  One  can  imagine  the 
serene  exaltation  of  these  first  days  under 
the  shadow  of  the  convent  in  that  secluded 
valley  of  Chevreuse. 

One  of  the  sentences  of  his  Memorial  was  a 
vow  of  Soumission  totale  a  Jesus-Christ  et  ti 
mon  directeur,  and  it  was  fitting  that  he  should 
make  confession  of  his  intellectual  wanderings 
to  M.  de  Saci  under  whose  guidance  he  had  been 
placed.  That  confession  we  have  in  the  record 
of  the  Dialogue  on  Epictetus  and  Montaigne. 
These  had  been  the  favourite  reading  of  Pascal, 
and  between  them  he  saw  the  wisdom  of  the 
natural  man  divided  into  two  tendencies  seem- 
ingly opposed,  yet,  in  their  final  relation  to  the 
truth,  one;  they  were  the  twin  pillars  of  human 
philosophy  between  which,  as  through  a  lofty 
gate,  he  passed  into  the  secret  garden  of  faith. 
On  the  one  side  stands  Epictetus,  the  apostle 
of  reason  and  unity,  whose  "diabolic  pride" 
teaches  that  man  by  following  the  light  of 
reason  can  acquire  perfect  virtue  and  happiness, 
can   lift   himself   to  knowledge   of   the  divine, 


no  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

even  to  companionship  with  God.  It  is  the 
moral  attitude  of  the  Stoic  that  chiefly  concerns 
Pascal,  and  he  passes  over  the  material  panthe- 
ism out  of  which  this  sin  of  presumption  springs. 
For,  grant  the  notion  of  a  god  who  is  but  a  subtler 
element  penetrating  the  world  and  of  a  soul 
which  is  but  a  particle  of  this  divine  fire,  grant 
this  cosmoplastic  atheism,  as  Cudworth  was  to 
call  it,  and  it  follows  that  virtue  and  reason 
and  nature  are  one,  and  that  happiness  is  the 
return  to  the  unity  of  natural  law.  But  the 
temptation  of  Pascal,  as  of  the  earnestly  religious 
temperament  in  general,  lay  in  the  other  di- 
rection, and  the  strength  of  his  argument  is 
turned  against  the  all-dissolving  logic  of  Epicu- 
rean scepticism.  More  particularly  he  dwells 
on  that  extraordinary  Apologie  de  Raimond  de 
Sebond,  in  which  Montaigne,  while  pretending 
to  confute  the  rationalism  of  the  atheist  but 
in  reality  sweeping  away  at  once  the  author- 
ity of  reason  and  of  faith,  leaves  mankind  the 
prey  of  universal  doubt.  In  this  concourse  of 
infinite  particles  driven  about  by  fortuitous  and 
inexplicable  impulse,  which  we  call  the  world, 
and  among  which  the  souls  of  men  float  for  a 
little  while  in  the  same  meaningless  abandon, 
what  room  is  there  for  rational  design  or  the 
harsh  rule  of  virtue  ?  Morality  to  the  philoso- 
pher of  this  school  is  no  more  than  the  prevailing 
custom;  reason  he  lowers  "to  the  level  of  the 


PASCAL  III 

beasts,  without  even  permitting  it  to  rise  from 
this  order  so  as  it  may  be  informed  by  its  Creator 
of  its  true  and  unperceived  rank."  For  if 
ostensibly,  after  the  manner  of  the  Christian, 
reason  is  rebuked  for  its  self-assumed  superi- 
ority to  faith,  in  reality  Montaigne  dissolves 
faith  also  in  the  same  menstruum  of  doubt. 
"In  all  that  he  says,"  adds  M.  de  Saci  in  one 
of  his  shrewd  rejoinders,  quoting  St.  Augustine, 
"  in  all  that  he  says  he  sets  faith  apart ;  accord- 
ingly we,  who  have  faith,  ought  in  like  fashion 
to  set  apart  all  that  he  says." 

Of  both  Epictetus  and  Montaigne  the  con- 
demnation in  the  end  is  the  same,  that  they 
reject  what  transcends  the  logic  of  the  senses; 
and  together  they  embrace  all  those  who  from 
the  beginning  have  been  content  to  base  their 
philosophy  on  the  seeming  order  or  the  seeming 
lawlessness  of  nature.  On  the  side  of  Epictetus 
are  ranged  the  deists  of  the  eighteenth  century 
and  the  scientific  deists  of  the  present;  with 
Montaigne  stand  those  who  call  themselves 
men  of  the  world,  whether  they  use  their  in- 
dividualism as  an  excuse  for  license  or  hide 
their  lack  of  principle  under  a  conformity  to 
the  codes  of  society.  They  are  children  of 
nature,  both  Stoic  and  Epicurean. 

And,  to  one  thinking  of  their  diverse  philos- 
ophies and  of  the  common  source  from  which 
these  philosophies  spring,  it  is  as  if  he  reflected 


112  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

on  the  seductive  panorama  of  a  summer's 
day — of  such  a  day,  he  may  fondly  imagine, 
as  that  on  which  Pascal  conversed  with  his 
director,  walking  on  the  hillsides  by  the  Port- 
Royal,  or  of  such  a  scene,  to  pass  from 
higher  things  to  low,  as  even  here  and  now  lies 
before  me  when  I  raise  my  eyes  from  the  page 
on  which  that  dialogue  is  recorded.  Along 
the  basin  of  its  wide-spread  valley,  Seneca  Lake 
(the  very  name  is  idly  significant)  rests  its 
waters  like  a  broad  and  quiet  river.  The  land 
from  the  opposite  bank  climbs  in  an  unbroken 
slope  toward  the  purple  distance,  lifting  into 
view  its  chequered  squares  of  corn  and  vineyard 
and  forest ;  while  over  all,  over  the  grey  expanse 
of  water,  the  green  fields,  and  the  yellow  har- 
vest, falls  the  great  white  light  of  August,  as  it 
were  the  visible  beatitude  of  universal  life — et 
large  diffuso  lumine  ridet.  Who,  looking  upon 
such  a  spectacle,  can  regard  the  earth  otherwise 
than  as  a  fecund  mother,  stern  but  beneficent 
to  her  children?  All  these  varying  colours  and 
forms  are  gathered  up  into  one  harmonious 
whole,  and  almost  the  observer  can  feel  beating 
within  it  the  heart,  responding  to  his  own  heart, 
of  some  controlling,  sentient,  unifying  power 
of  which  it  is  the  glorious  body.  But  if  unity 
is  the  immediate  impression  of  such  a  scene,  it 
is  not  the  last.  Gradually,  as  the  warmth  of 
the  imagination  cools,  the  mind  is  caught  by  the 


PASCAL  113 

innumerable  details  that  were  ignored  in  the 
first  general  view;  we  begin  to  tear  to  pieces 
this  artificial  fabric  of  the  fancy,  and,  if  the 
analytic  faculty  is  left  free,  we  grow  almost 
painfully  aware  of  the  individual  objects,  them- 
selves each  but  a  collection  of  parts,  that 
jostle  with  more  and  more  irregularity  of  ca- 
price as  our  inspection  becomes  more  minute. 
This  verdant  field,  for  example,  has  no  organ- 
ised existence  in  itself,  but,  rather,  here  are 
countless  blades  of  grass  and  weeds,  each  an 
independent  life,  all  tangled  and  struggling 
together  in  inextricable  confusion.  In  place 
of  uniformity  we  are  made  aware  of  incom- 
prehensible diversity;  from  unity  we  pass 
to  endless  multiplicity,  from  law  and  design 
to  chance  and  caprice.  Nay  more,  what  had 
awed  the  imagination  by  its  aspect  of  ageless 
stability  sinks  to  the  fleeting  image  of  a  mo- 
ment, and  the  mind  gropes  helplessly  among 
the  uncounted  changes  and  combinations  of 
the  past,  and  among  the  endless  rearrange- 
ments of  the  future,  between  which  these 
ephemeral  growths,  together  with  the  solid 
bed  of  the  hills,  rest  for  an  instant,  or  to  us 
so  seem  to  rest  who  are  ourselves  but  passing 
phenomena  caught  from  the  eternal  flux.^ 

»  There  is  nothing  fantastic  in  connecting  the  phi- 
losophies of  Stoic  and  Epicurean  with  such  reflections 
on  the  aspects  of  natural  scenery.      Shaftesbury,  who 
8 


114  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

No  doubt  there  is  something  subHme  in  the 
'  Stoic's  illusion  of  a  soul  animating  and  unifying 
nature,  something  noble,  if  pathetic,  in  his  re- 
ligion of  law  and  order  and  self-subordination; 
no  doubt  there  is  a  legitimate  interest,  it  may- 
even  be  sanctified  by  a  kind  of  religious  sym- 
pathy, in  the  Epicurean's  occupation  with  the 
inexhaustible  diversity  of  passing  phenomena; 
these  indeed  make  up  what  we  call  our  imagina- 
tive and  intellectual  life.  But  it  still  remains  to 
be  said  that  neither  the  sublimity  of  the  one  nor 
the  curiosity  of  the  other  has  any  but  a  remote 
kinship  with  religion  as  Pascal  and  the  saints 
understood  that  sacred  word.  True  religion 
begins  when  the  inner  eye  is  opened  to  the 
I  terrible  cleft  between  this  realm  of  nature  and 
!  a  power  not  of  nature.  As  the  mind  resolves 
the  seeming  harmony  of  the  world  into  a  huddled 
congeries  of  details,  we  become  aware  that 
each  of  these  details  is  an  individual  force 
striving  for  its  own  existence  at  the  expense 
of  its  neighbours.  The  soil  represents  the  de- 
cay of  earlier  strata ;  every  blade  of  grass  means 
the  ruthless  triumph  over  some  weaker  plant; 
the  life  of  every  animal  is  sustained  by  the 

made  Epictetus  his  bible,  in  more  than  one  page  of  his 
Characteristics  deduces  his  creed  from  a  generaHsed 
prospect  of  some  smiling  landscape;  whereas  to  Mande- 
ville,  who  wrote  as  an  Epicurean  in  professed  hostility 
to  Shaftesbury,  the  physical  world  is  "a  frightful 
chaos  of  evil." 


PASCAL 


115 


continual  death  of  other  organisations;  and  the 
very  footprints  of  man  upon  the  earth  are 
marks  of  destruction.  Nor  does  this  conflict 
cease  with  the  lower  orders  of  nature.  In  his 
Discours  sur  les  passions  de  V amour  Pascal  di- 
vided the  ruling  motives  of  mankind  into  love 
and  ambition,  and  what  are  these  but  the 
supreme  expressions  of  the  same  devouring 
egotism — love  the  desire  to  draw  another  indi- 
vidual to  ourselves  from  the  common  good, 
ambition  the  will  to  raise  ourselves  above 
our  fellows?  "To  a  good  man,"  says  Bacon, 
speaking  for  the  Stoic  and  scientific  deist, 
"cruelty  seems  a  mere  tragical  fiction."  Tragi- 
cal, indeed;  but  fiction?  Is  not  cruelty  rather 
the  very  basis  and  reality  of  life  as  it  presents 
itself  ever3rwhere  to  us,  smiling  amid  its  hateful 
triumphs?  Can  anything  be  conceived  more 
cruel  than  the  so-called  law  of  progress?  1     True, 

« Huxley  with  his  usual  force  and  concision  has 
expressed  this  truth  for  the  modern  believer  in  evolu- 
tion :  "From  the  point  of  view  of  the  moralist,  the  an- 
imal world  is  on  about  the  same  level  as  a  gladiator's 
show.  The  creatures  are  fairly  well  treated,  and  set  to 
fight — whereby  the  strongest,  the  swiftest,  and  the  cun- 
ningest  live  to  fight  another  day.  The  spectator  has  no 
need  to  turn  his  thumbs  down,  as  no  quarter  is  given. 
He  must  admit  that  the  skill  and  training  displayed  are 
wonderful.  But  he  must  shut  his  eyes  if  he  would 
not  see  that  more  or  less  enduring  suffering  is  the  meed 
of  both  vanquished  and  victor.     And  since  the  great 


Il6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

there  spreads  out  at  the  summit  this  society  of 
ours,  founded  on  mutual  concessions  and,  some 
would  have  us  believe,  on  an  instinct  of  mutual 
sympathy.  But  is  not  the  social  order,  as  Plato 
taught  in  his  parable  of  the  autochthons  and  as 
Hobbes  from  the  opposite  point  of  view  saw  with 
equal  clearness,  dependent  on  a  carefully  fos- 
tered illusion?  What  has  history  to  say  of  the 
social  order  when  a  people  arrives  at  conscious- 
ness? Alas,  such  self-knowledge  is  just  the 
dissipation  of  this  cherished  deceit  and  means 
the  resolution  of  social  sympathy  into  its 
component  elements  of  egotism.  A  thousand  ex- 
amples show,  how  plainly!  that  self-conscious- 
ness means  the  reversal  of  evolution  and  the 
descent  of  man  into  self-centred  license — either 
this  or  the  rise  to  that  higher  law  which  spoke 
to  the  Hindu  ascetic  in  his  self-communings , 
to  Socrates  in  the  oracle,  and  to  Pascal  from 
the  Church.  The  awakening  to  the  painful 
egotism  of  nature  and  especially  of  the  natural 

game  is  going  on  in  every  corner  of  the  world,  thousands 
of  times  a  minute;  since,  were  our  ears  sharp  enough, 
we  need  not  descend  to  the  gates  of  hell  to  hear — 

sospiri,  pianti,  ed  alti  guai. 
Voci  alte  e  fioche,  e  suon  di  man  con  elle 

— it  seems  to  follow  that,  if  this  world  is  governed  by 
benevolence,  it  must  be  a  different  sort  of  benevolence 
from  that  of  John  Howard." 


PASCAL  117 

man  within  himself  is  for  the  Christian  the  con- 
viction of  sin;  religion  is  the  submissive  heark- 
ening to  the  voice  which  pronounces  judgment 
on  that  state  and  proclaims  to  man  that  he 
belongs  to  another  sphere.  It  was  from  the 
point  of  view  of  this  religious  dualism  that 
Pascal  in  his  Dialogue  condemned  his  old 
teachers: 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  source  of  the  errors  of  these 
two  sects  is  due  to  their  ignorance  of  the  difference 
between  the  state  of  man  at  present  and  the  state  of 
man  as  created.  Hence  one  of  them,  observing  some 
traces  of  his  first  grandeur  and  ignoring  his  corruption, 
has  treated  nature  as  sane  and  without  need  of  a  re- 
storer, which  leads  him  to  the  height  of  pride;  whereas 
the  other,  feehng  the  present  misery  and  ignoring 
his  first  dignity,  treats  nature  as  necessarily  infirm 
and  incapable  of  restoration,  which  casts  him  into  a 
despair  of  arriving  at  true  happiness  and  so  into  an 
extreme  cowardice.  .  .  .  From  these  half-lights  it  hap- 
pens thus  that  the  one,  knowing  the  duties  of  man 
and  being  ignorant  of  his  weakness,  is  lost  in  pre- 
sumption, and  that  the  other,  knowing  his  weakness 
and  not  his  duty,  falls  into  base  cowardice.  Whence 
it  seems,  since  the  one  is  truth  where  the  other  is 
error,  that  by  combining  them  we  might  form  a 
perfect  morality.  But,  instead  of  this  peace,  there 
would  only  result  from  their  association  war  and  gen- 
eral destruction.  .  .  .  And  the  reason  is  that  these  sages 
of  the  world  place  their  contraries  in  the  same  subject; 
for  one  attributed  grandeur  to  nature  and  the  other  weak- 
ness to  this  same  nature,  which  cannot  subsist  together. 
But  it  is  otherwise  with  faith  which  teaches  us  to  give 
these  qualities  to   different   subjects,  all  that  is  infirm 


Il8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

belonging  to  nature,  all  that  is  puissant  belonging  to 
Grace.  Here,  indeed,  is  the  new  and  astonishing  union 
which  God  alone  could  teach  and  which  he  alone  could 
make,  and  which  is  nothing  other  than  an  image  and 
an  effect  of  the  ineffable  union  of  two  natures  in  the 
single  person  of  the  God-man. 

The  distinction  between  worldly  wisdom 
and  faith,  between  the  spurious  dualism  of  the 
philosophies  and  the  true  dualism  of  religion, 
could  not  be  expressed  more  clearly  and  em- 
phatically. Something  of  the  double  aspect  of 
nature  may  remain  with  the  Christian.  The 
world  may  still,  to  the  enlightened  eye,  show 
some  vestiges  of  the  glory  it  first  received  from 
the  hand  of  its  Creator,  and  may  thus  have  its 
sacramental  lesson.  "  All  things  cover  some 
mystery,"  wrote  Pascal  in  a  letter  to  Mile,  de 
Roannez;  "  all  things  are  veils  that  cover  God  J 
and  Christians  should  recognise  Him  in  all.'/ 
But  even  here  there  is  danger,  as  he  had  seen 
from  the  beginning.  "  For,  whatever  resem- 
blance created  nature  may  have  to  its  Creator, 
and  however  the  least  things  and  the  smallest 
and  most  despicable  parts  of  the  world  may 
represent  at  least  by  their  unity  the  perfect 
unity  which  is  found  only  in  God,  we  cannot 
lawfully  bring  to  them  our  sovereign  respect, 
since  there  is  nothing  so  abominable  in  the  eyes 
of  God  and  of  men  as  idolatry."  {Letter  to 
Mme.  Perier.)     After  all,  of  what  concern  are 


PASCAL  119 

these  things  to  the  soul?  "Thence  it  comes 
that  she  begins  to  consider  as  a  nothing  all  that 
which  must  return  into  nothing — the  heavens, 
the  earth,  her  mind,  her  body,  her  kindred,  her 
friends,  her  enemies;  wealth,  poverty;  disgrace, 
prosperity ;  honour,  ignominy ;  esteem,  contempt ; 
authority,  indigence;  health,  sickness,  and  life 
itself.  In  a  word  all  that  shall  endure  less  than 
a  man's  soul  is  incapable  of  satisfying  the  desire 
of  this  soul,  that  searches  with  earnestness  to 
establish  herself  in  a  felicity  as  enduring  as 
herself."  {Sur  la  conversion  du  pecheur.)  And 
that  felicity  is  found  only  in  God.  The  true 
dualism  lies  in  the  contrast  between  nature  and 
Grace,  in  the  opposition  and  reconciliation 
between  the  man  and  his  Creator. 

By  such  paths,  under  the  guidance  of  the 
directors  of  Port- Royal,  Pascal  had  reached  a 
position  almost  identical  with  that  of  St.  Augus- 
tine. In  the  attempt  to  explain  the  inexplicable 
he  had,  like  his  master,  accepted  the  theory  of 
the  Fall,  thus  making  the  cleft  between  the  per- 
fect and  the  imperfect  to  grow  out  of  a  particular 
incident  in  time;  his  conviction  of  sin  was  the 
consciousness  of  an  absolute  hostility  between 
two  entities,  the  Creator  and  the  created  soul; 
his  hope  of  salvation  lay  only  in  the  magical 
and  total  transformation  of  the  man's  personality 
into  conformity  with  God's  personality;  rebirth 
into  harmony  with   the  infinite    will  could  be 


I20  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

effected  by  no  act  or  repeated  acts  and  by  no 
cooperation  of  the  finite  will,  as  is  implied  by 
the  very  terms  infinite  and  finite,  but  was  the 
work  of  divine  unaccountable  Grace;  the  be- 
ginning of  the  reconciliation  within  the  human 
being  of  the  eternal  and  the  ephemeral  nar- 
rowed itself  to  the  appearance  in  history  of  the 
mythical  God-man; — in  a  word,  Pascal  was 
purely  and  intensely  a  Christian.  Let  us 
admit,  if  compelled,  that  his  theology  in- 
cluded an  element  intrinsically  illogical  and 
ultimately  self-destructive;  but  let  us  hum- 
bly acknowledge  also  that  this  worship  of 
an  infinite  personal  God  was  no  dead  abstrac- 
tion but  a  living  reality,  abounding  in  the 
fervour  of  holiness  and  supremely  and  terribly 
beautiful;  that  the  religion  of  an  Augustine 
and  a  Pascal  is  a  manifestation  of  faith  beyond 
the  comprehension  of  worldly  philosophy  and 
far  above  the  reach  of  worldly  men. 

It  is  inevitable,  for  reasons  historical  and 
essential,  that  the  names  of  Pascal  and  St. 
Augustine  should  be  joined  together,  yet  one 
cannot  study  the  lives  of  these  two  men  without 
perceiving  a  difference  in  their  spirit.  In  read- 
ing Augustine  one  is  almost  in  the  exultant  joy 
of  a  great  acquisition;  in  Pascal,  through  all 
the  ecstasy  of  vivid  intuition  and  despite  his 
evident  pleasure  in  the  triumphs  of  satire,  too 
often  one  feels  the  underlying  pain  of  a  great 


PASCAL  121 

renunciation.  There  is  a  half-truth  in  the 
romantic  conception  of  Pascal  as  a  tragic  victim 
of  the  struggle  between  intellect  and  heart, 
between  doubt  and  faith,  and  in  Jules  Lemaitre's 
image  of  the  cross  raised  upon  the  tomb  in 
which  the  saint  had  buried  reason  and  glory 
and  genius: 

Mais  sous  rentassement  des  ruines  vivantes 

L'abime  se  rouvrait,  et,  pleine  d'  ^pouvantes, 

La  croix  du  R^dempteur  tremblait  comme  un  roseau. 

But  this  change  of  tone  from  Augustine  to 
Pascal  is  not  so  much  due  to  a  difference  of 
creed  or  to  any  lesser  grasp  of  faith  in  the 
later  man,  as  to  the  larger  movement  of  history. 
It  is  simply  that  Augustine  lived  when  Christian- 
ity was  at  the  summit  of  its  first  wave  of  victory, 
whereas  Pascal  saw  all  about  him  the  waning 
of  the  waters;  and  that  the  inner  life  of  the 
Christian  needs  the  support  of  the  world  to 
overcome  the  inherent  paradox  of  its  theology. 
When  Augustine  fought  and  for  the  time  van- 
quished Pelagianism,  the  question  was  still 
to  a  certain  extent  one  of  abstract  truth;  when 
in  the  seventeenth  century  the  same  debate  arose 
between  Jansenist  and  Jesuit  it  had  become  a 
conflict  for  the  life  of  the  Church,  and  the  day 
belonged  to  the  Jesuit. 

The  Church  of  Rome  had  always,  and  almost 
necessarily,  inclined  at  heart  toward  Pelagian- 
ism, and  its  history  during  the  Middle  Ages  and 


122  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

later  might  be  summed  up  in  the  statement  of 
a  gradual  lapse  from  its  more  austere  creed,  re- 
tarded at  intervals  by  the  dominance  of  some  fer- 
vid Augustinian  or  half-Augustinian.  Much  of 
the  power  of  St.  Anselm  may  thus  be  attributed 
to  his  skill  in  reviving  Augustine's  opposition  be- 
tween the  divine  and  human  personalities;  al- 
though in  his  argument  Cur  deus  homo,  which  was 
meant  to  be  a  bulwark  of  the  pure  faith,  there  is 
discoverable  an  insidious  way  of  approach  for 
Pelagianism.  Augustine  had  left  in  a  state  of 
uncertainty  the  connection  between  the  act 
of  saving  Grace  and  the  sacrifice  on  the  Cross, 
Anselm  undertook  to  supply  this  deficiency  by 
his  doctrine  of  Satisfaction.  The  honour  of 
God  was  touched  by  man's  rebellion  and  de- 
manded satisfaction;  this  was  afforded  by  the 
voluntary  death  of  Christ,  who  as  infinite  God 
could  satisfy  an  offence  to  infinite  honour,  and 
as  man  could  stand  for  the  human  race.  So 
far  Augustine  might  have  gone  with  him,  how- 
ever strange  to  him  might  have  seemed  this 
reduction  of  religion  to  the  terms  of  mediae- 
val chivalry.  But  he  would  have  revolted 
from  the  consequent  statement  that  man  was 
thereby  rendered  free  to  make  his  way  back 
to  God's  favour  by  acts  of  merit.  Of  like  sort 
was  the  reformation  of  the  twelfth  century 
under  St.  Bernard,  the  Augustinus  redivivus 
as  he  is  called.     Yet  here  again,   in  the  new 


PASCAL 


123 


element  Introduced  by  Bernard  of  passionate 
meditation  on  Christ  as  the  suffering  bride- 
groom of  the  soul,  there  is  a  concession,  in 
emotion  if  not  in  logic,  to  the  humanising 
tendency  of  Pelagianism.  Later,  the  immense 
labor  of  Thomas  Aquinas  was  to  develop  the 
doctrine  of  St.  Augustine  into  an  impenetrable 
web  of  Aristotelian  metaphysic,  but  withal  he 
could  not  exclude  an  admixture  of  Aristotle's 
notion  of  virtue  as  a  habit  and  thus  as  some- 
thing outside  of  the  operation  of  Grace.  And 
still  again  "Back  to  Augustinianism  "  was  the 
watchword  of  the  Reformation,  however  we 
may  think  that  the  leaders  of  that  movement 
missed  the  heart  of  the  master's  teaching.  But 
this  is  no  place  to  follow  in  detail  the  fluctuat- 
ing fortunes  of  Augustinianism  and  Pelagianism. 
The  essential  matter  is  that  the  main  trend  of 
thought  was  toward  the  latter — Totus  etenim 
pcBne  mundus  post  Pelagium  abiit  in  errorem — 
as  shown  by  the  dissolution  of  scholastic  phi- 
losophy in  the  Pelagian  Nominalism  of  Occam; 
by  the  artful  ambiguities  of  the  Tridentine 
Council,  which,  being  forced  by  the  contentions 
of  the  Protestants  to  confirm  the  doctrine  of 
St.  Augustine,  contrived  to  do  so  in  formulae 
that  might  without  violence  be  interpreted  as 
a  support  to  the  contrary  practice;  by  the 
memorable  Constitution  Unigenitus,  which  re- 
pudiated the  Augustinian  revival  of  the  early 


124  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

eighteenth  century;  by  the  acceptance  of 
Alphonso  Liguori,  with  his  theory  of  ^Equi- 
Probabilism,  as  the  "Teacher  of  the  Church"; 
finally,  by  the  dogma  of  the  Infallibility  of  the 
Pope,  consummating  the  priestly  organisation 
into  a  power  to  mould  and  control  religion  as  a 
militant  institution. 

Through  his  association  with  Port- Royal 
and  through  the  uncompromising  force  of  his 
religious  convictions  Pascal  was  caught  into  the 
turmoil  of  one  of  the  bitterest  of  these  disputes 
— into  a  dispute  of  innumerable  ramifica- 
tions all  leading  back  to  the  irreconcilable  differ- 
ence on  the  question  of  Grace.  There  were  three 
parties  to  the  contest :  on  one  side  the  Jansenists, 
on  the  other  the  Jesuits  and,  for  the  nonce, 
their  half-willing  allies,  the  Dominicans  or 
Neo-Thomists.  Briefly,  the  case  stood  thus: 
In  1588  the  position  of  the  Jesuits  had  been 
formulated  by  the  subtle  work  of  Luis  Molina, 
{Liberi  arbitrii  cum  graticF  donis,  divina  prcz- 
scientia,  providentia,  prcsdestinatione,  et  reproba- 
tione  Concordia,)  in  which,  under  the  pretext 
of  harmonising  free  will  and  Grace,  the  former 
was  made  the  real  agent  in  man's  salvation 
while  to  the  latter  was  left  only  an  auxiliary 
role.  To  counteract  this  poison  of  Pelagianism, 
as  he  deemed  it,  Cornelius  Jansen  (or  Janse- 
nius),  Bishop  of  Ypres,  set  himself  the  enormous 
task  of  reducing  the  scattered  and  not  always 


PASCAL  125 

consistent  theological  dicta  of  St.  Augustine 
to  a  coherent  system,  and  his  book,  properly- 
called  Augustinus,  was  published  in  1640, 
after  the  author's  death. 

Meanwhile  Jean  du  Vergier  de  Hauranne, 
Abbe  de  Saint-Cyran,  the  friend  and  fellow- 
labourer  of  Jansenius,  had  become  director  of 
the  abbaye  de  Port-Royal,  and  had  made  that 
convent  of  Cistercian  nuns  the  centre  of  the 
breaking  storm.  About  its  homes  in  Paris 
and  in  the  sombre  valley  of  Chevreuse  not  far 
from  Versailles  he  had  gathered  a  little  band  of 
learned  and  pious  men  who  were  to  be  the 
nucleus  of  a  far-reaching  reform  in  the  Church. 
Saint-Cyran  himself,  a  genius  of  religion  if 
ever  there  were  one,  died  in  1643,  with  his 
larger  designs  unaccomplished,  but  he  was  ably, 
if  less  ambitiously,  succeeded  by  M.  Singlin  and 
by  M.  de  Saci.  Naturally  the  Jesuits,  who  had 
the  civil  authority  on  their  side,  were  on  the 
lookout  for  an  opportunity  of  attack,  and  they 
did  not  have  to  wait  long.  In  1653  they  obtained 
from  the  Pope  a  Bull  censuring  five  propositions 
so  selected  and  stated  as  to  set  the  doctrine 
of  Jansenius  in  the  most  extreme  light.  Im- 
mediately there  arose  a  double  wrangle  as  to 
whether,  in  the  first  place,  the  condemned 
propositions  were  really  to  be  found  in  the 
book  Augustinus,  and,  secondly,  whether  they 
were  unorthodox.     In  a  Lettre  a  un  due  et  pair 


126  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

(M.  de  Luynes)  Antoine  Arnauld,  a  doctor  of 
the  Sorbonne  and  the  most  learned  of  the 
Port- Royalists,  while  professing  submission  to 
the  Papal  Bull,  expressed  a  doubt  as  to  the 
former  question.  But  his  caution  did  not 
save  him  from  the  wily  adversary.  The  Jesuits 
retorted  that  his  Lettre  (i)  justified  the  book  of 
Jansenius,  and  (2)  itself  repeated  one  of  the 
condemned  errors  by  saying  that  the  Gospel 
and  the  Fathers  showed  us,  in  the  person  of 
St.  Peter  denying  Christ,  a  just  man  deprived 
for  the  time  of  necessary  Grace.  On  the  first 
of  December,  1655,  they  laid  a  report  before 
the  Faculty  of  Theology,  accusing  Arnauld  on 
these  two  points,  of  fact  and  of  right.  The 
deliberation  at  the  Sorbonne  lasted  for  a  year, 
but  the  meetings  were  packed,  free  discussion 
was  hampered,  and  a  Public  Censure  finally 
pronounced.  On  the  other  side,  the  partisans 
of  Port-Royal,  despairing  of  victory  and  fore- 
seeing the  peril  of  their  position,  took  counsel 
of  war.  One  day  when  Pascal  was  with  certain 
of  his  friends,  the  ignorance  of  the  people  on  the 
real  point  at  issue  and  the  skill  of  the  Jesuits  in 
throwing  dust  came  up  in  the  conversation  and 
some  one  proposed  that  a  clear  and  brief  state- 
ment of  the  case  should  be  published.  All  ap- 
proved of  the  plan,  but  no  one  volunteered  to 
carry  it  out.  Pascal  then  said  that  he  conceived 
how  such  a  statement  should    be  framed,  and 


PASCAL  127 

agreed  to  draw  up  a  sketch  if  some  one  else, 
more  trained  as  a  writer,  would  give  it  polish 
and  shape.  His  sketch  turned  out  so  ad- 
mirable in  execution  that,  by  the  advice  of 
his  friends,  it  was  printed  forthwith  and 
without  revision.  So  it  happened  that,  on 
the  23d  January,  1656,  there  appeared,  an- 
onymously, the  first  of  the  eighteen  Lettres  d. 
un  Provincial,  or,  as  they  came  to  be  called 
more  familiarly,  Lettres  provinciates,  which 
form  together  perhaps  the  most  notable  single 
piece  of  prose  in  the  French  language. 

The  plan  of  the  Lettres  is  calculated  to  support 
their  tone  of  sustained  irony  broken  by  occa- 
sional passages  of  deadly  invective.  They  are 
supposed  to  be  written  to  a  friend  in  the  prov- 
inces, giving  news  of  the  dispute  that  is  agitat- 
ing Paris.  After  a  humorous  account  of  the 
actual  point  in  debate,  they  pass  to  the  real 
issue  concealed  beneath  this  chicanery.  In 
the  guise  of  an  innocent  inquirer  the  writer 
gets  from  a  Jesuit  acquaintance  and  from  a 
Dominican  a  statement  of  their  theories,  which 
sets  in  the  most  ridiculous  light  their  attempt 
to  preserve  the  old  accepted  doctrine  of  Grace 
while  changing  it  substantially  to  a  Pelagian 
practice.  With  the  Dominicans,  who  are  log- 
ically with  Jansenism  but  politically  with  the 
Jesuits,  he  makes  short  shrift  by  displaying 
their  inconsistency.     "  '  But  tell  me,  my  Father, 


128  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

this  Grace  given  to  all  men  is  sufficient  f ' — 
'Yes',  said  he. — 'And  nevertheless  it  has  no 
effect  without  efficacious  Grace?' — 'That  is  true,' 
said  he. — 'And  all  men  have  Grace  sufficient,' 
I  continued, 'and  all  do  not  have  it  efficacious?' — 
'It  is  true,'  said  he. — 'That  is  to  say,'  I  said  to 
him,  'that  all  have  enough  of  Grace,  and  all  do 
not  have  enough  of  it;  that  is  to  say,  this  Grace 
suffices,  although  it  does  not  suffice;  that  is 
to  say,  it  is  sufficient  in  name,  and  insufficient 
in  effect.  In  good  faith,  my  Father,  this 
doctrine  is  mighty  subtle.  Have  you  forgotten, 
on  leaving  the  world,  what  the  word  sufficient 
signifies  there?  '  "  No  wonder  that  Pascal  ex- 
claims: Le  monde  se  paie  de  paroles!  But  with 
the  Jesuits  the  fault  strikes  deeper: 

I  learned  then,  in  a  word,  that  their  quarrel  in  re- 
gard to  sufficient  Grace  lies  herein.  The  Jesuits 
claim  that  there  is  a  Grace  given  generally  to  all  men, 
submitted  in  such  a  way  to  man's  free  will  that  man 
renders  it  efficacious  or  inefficacious  at  his  choice, 
without  any  new  assistance  from  God,  and  without  any 
failure  on  its  part  to  act  effectively;  wherefore  they 
call  it  sufficient,  because  it  alone  suffices  for  action. 
Whereas  the  Jansenists,  on  the  contrary,  hold  that 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  Grace  actually  sufficient 
which  is  not  also  efficacious;  that  is  to  say,  all  Grace 
which  does  not  determine  the  will  to  act  effectively 
is  insufficient  for  action;  for  they  say  that  a  man  never 
acts  without  efficacious  Grace.     Such  is  their  quarrel. 

One  thing  comes  clearly  to  view  through 
this  splitting  up  of  Grace  into  different  kinds 


PASCAL  129 

and  through  this  shuffling  of  words — the  pure 
Pelagianism  of  the  Jesuits.  The  real  act  of 
salvation  is  made  to  proceed  not  from  God  but 
from  the  human  will;  and  Pascal  saw,  as  St. 
Augustine  in  his  day  saw,  that  such  a  belief 
meant  the  smoothing  away  of  the  break  between 
the  divine  and  the  natural,  the  lowering  of  the 
infinite  to  the  compass  of  the  finite,  and  the 
obscuring  of  the  veritable  sting  of  evil.  Ecce 
qui  tollit  peccata  mundi,  he  says  mockingly 
of  one  of  these  Doctors  too  complaisant  to  the 
infirmity  of  fallen  nature;  and,  beginning  with 
the  fourth  Letter,  he  devotes  most  of  his  energy 
to  scourging  the  absurdities  and  indecencies 
of  the  system  of  casuistry  based  on  this  lax 
theology.  The  connection  is  exposed  with 
his  usual  vigour  and  directness: 

As  their  [the  Jesuitical  casuists']  morality  is  altogether 
pagan,  nature  suffices  to  follow  it.  When  we  sustain 
the  necessity  of  efficacious  Grace,  we  give  it  other 
virtues  for  an  object.  It  is  not  simply  to  cure  vices 
by  other  vices;  it  is  not  only  to  make  men  practice 
the  outer  duties  of  religion;  it  is  for  a  virtue  higher 
than  that  of  the  Pharisees  and  of  the  wisest  pagans. 
The  law  and  reason  are  forms  of  grace  sufficient  for 
those  effects.  But,  to  disengage  the  soul  from  the 
love  of  the  world,  to  withdraw  it  from  what  it  holds 
most  dear,  to  make  it  die  unto  itself,  to  lift  it  and 
attach  it  solely  and  unchangingly  to  God, — this  is  not 
the  work  save  of  an  omnipotent  hand. 

To  cure  vices  by  other  vices — such  a  method 
9 


130  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

is  below  the  morality  of  the  Pharisees  and  the 
pagans,  and  Pascal  spares  no  pains  to  prove 
that  it  really  underlies  the  casuistry  of  Escobar 
(Qui  est  Escobar,  lui  dis-je,  mon  pere? — Quoi! 
vous  ne  savez  pas  qui  est  Escobar  de  notre 
Societe,  qui  a  compile  cette  Th^ologie  morale 
de  vingt-quatre  de  nos  peres?)  and  of  other 
accepted  authorities  of  the  Jesuit  school.  The 
two  militant  arms  of  the  method  are  Probabil- 
ism  and  the  doctrine  of  Intentions. 

Probabilism:  The  affirmative  and  the  negative 
of  most  opinions  have  each  some  probability,  in  the 
judgment  of  our  Doctors,  and  sufficient  to  be  followed 
with  assurance  of  conscience.  It  is  not  that  the  pro 
and  the  contra  are  both  true  in  the  same  sense;  that 
is  impossible;  but  merely  that  they  are  both  proba- 
ble, and  consequently  sure.  ...  A  man  may  do  that 
which  he  thinks  permitted  according  to  a  probable 
opinion,  although  the  contrary  is  surer.  Now  the 
opinion  of  a  single  grave  Doctor  is  sufficient  for  this. 

Intention:  Whoever  is  obstinate  in  having  no  other 
end  in  his  evil  act  than  the  evil  itself,  with  such  an  one 
we  break;  that  is  diabolic:  there  is  here  no  exception 
of  age,  sex,  or  quality.  But  when  a  man  is  not  in  this 
unfortunate  disposition,  then  we  try  to  put  in  practice 
our  method  of  directing  the  intention,  which  consists 
in  proposing  a  permitted  object  for  the  end  of  his 
actions. 

To  illustrate  this  system  of  Probabilism  and 
Intention  Pascal  gives  a  series  of  examples, 
drawn  with  scrupulous  care  from  the  author- 
itative books   of  casuistry  which  are,   to   say 


PASCAL  131 

the  least,  unedifying.  Thus,  it  is  commanded 
in  the  Gospel  to  bestow  alms  out  of  one's  super- 
fluity; but  here  is  ready  at  hand  the  opinion 
of  a  grave  Doctor,  which  nullifies  the  command 
by  a  slight  twist  of  definition:  "That  which 
men  of  the  world  keep  in  order  to  raise  their 
state  and  that  of  their  family,"  he  opines,  "is 
not  called  superfluous;  and  for  this  reason  you 
will  scarcely  ever  find  any  superfluity  among 
people  of  the  world,  or  even  among  kings." 
So  men  of  the  world  have  the  habit  of  fighting 
duels  and  thus  breaking  the  sixth  command- 
ment. The  practice  is  no  doubt  reprehensible, 
but  if  you  can  persuade  the  duellist  that  his 
intention  in  fighting  is  not  to  injure  his  opponent 
but  to  preserve  his  own  honour,  why,  the  act  is 
relieved  of  evil.  Again,  the  Church  prescribes 
certain  times  of  fasting,  but  offers  relief  in 
necessary  cases.  Suppose  then  that  "  a  man 
has  fatigued  himself  in  some  way,  as  ad  inse- 
quendam  amicam,  is  he  obliged  to  fast?  By  no 
means.  But  if  he  has  fatigued  himself  purposely 
in  order  to  be  dispensed  from  fasting,  shall 
he  be  held  to  it?  Even  if  he  had  this  express 
design,  he  shall  not  be  obliged  to  fast."  And 
still  again,  the  Popes  have  excommunicated 
priests  who  lay  aside  their  robe.  Now,  "on 
what  occasions  may  a  priest  lay  aside  his  robe 
without  incurring  this  excommunication?  .  .  . 
If  he  lays  it  aside  for  a  shameful  act,  such   as 


132  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

for  thieving,  or  for  going  incognito  into  places 
of  debauch,  because  in  such  cases  his  intention 
may  be  to  divert  scandal  from  the  Church." 

Worse  examples  can  be  found  in  the  books, 
worse  are  quoted  by  Pascal;  but  these  are 
sufficient  to  show  the  animus  of  his  satire.  It 
remains  to  ask  whether  the  attack  was  just,  and 
to  this  question  there  is  a  double  answer.  No 
right-minded  man,  it  should  seem,  can  escape 
a  feeling  of  indignation  or  disgust  at  much  of 
the  theory  and  practice  of  the  Jesuits.  There 
is  something  repulsive  in  the  thought  of  these 
celibate  priests  gloating  with  such  fond  minute- 
ness upon  all  the  filthy  possibilities  of  human 
vice;  their  responses  show  too  frequently  a 
complaisance  in  their  subtlety  of  dialect  rather 
than  a  wholesome  sense  of  right  and  wrong; 
their  casuistry  in  part  suggests  the  often- 
repudiated  maxim:  Do  evil  that  good  may 
come.  Viewed  in  many  of  its  particulars, 
their  morality  deserves  the  anathema  of  Pas- 
cal: VcB  duplici  corde,  et  ingredienii  duabus  viis! 
And  Pascal  was  right  in  laying  his  finger  on  the 
cause  of  this  laxity.  "Know  then,"  he  says, 
"that  their  object  is  nut  to  corrupt  morals: 
that  is  not  their  .design.  But  neither  have 
they  the  reformation  of  morals  for  their  unique 
aim :  that  would  be  a  bad  policy.  Their  thought 
is  this:  They  have  a  sufficiently  good  opinion 
of  themselves  to  believe  that  it  is  useful  and 


PASCAL  133 

even  necessary  to  the  welfare  of  religion  that 
their  credit  should  be  extended  everywhere  and 
that  they  should  govern  all  consciences.  And 
as  the  severe  maxims  of  the  Gospel  are  proper 
for  governing  some  kinds  of  people,  they  make 
use  of  these  on  suitable  occasions.  But  as  these 
same  maxims  are  not  in  accord  with  the  views 
of  the  majority,  they  abandon  them  in  regard 
to  such  people,  in  order  to  have  what  may 
satisfy  all  the  world."  The  simple  fact  is  that 
the  Church  by  this  time  had  come  to  an  impasse 
from  which  the  Jesuits  were  doing  all  in  their 
power  to  deliver  her.  From  the  beginning  the 
dilemma  of  a  double  ideal  had  confronted  her; 
she  was  forced  to  choose  or  to  make  what 
compromise  she  could  between  the  renunciation 
of  the  world  and  the  conquest  of  the  world. 
Strictly  speaking,  religion  meant  renunciation, 
and  renunciation  only,  and  for  the  few  who  pos- 
sessed the  divine  gift  of  faith  this  ideal  could  not 
be  presented  too  purely.  But  the  Church  had  a 
mission  for  the  many  as  well  as  for  the  few,  and, 
as  her  organisation  developed,  as  she  was  com- 
pelled to  take  into  account  the  increasing 
complexities  of  civilisation,  the  other  ideal  of 
world-dominion  became  correspondingly  insist- 
ent. While  not  openly  repudiating  the  faith  of 
Augustine  she  was  obliged,  in  controlling  men  of 
the  world,  to  make  the  Pelagian  appeal  to  the 
human  will  more  and  more  her  principle  of  action. 


134  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

And  her  system  of  morality  suffered  the  same 
change.  She  erred  grossly  in  so  far  as  she 
undertook  to  cure  vices  with  other  vices — and 
to  this  extent  there  was  no  answer  to  Pascal's 
invective — but,  unless  she  was  ready  to  surren- 
der her  claim  to  govern  all  consciences,  she  could 
not  escape  the  necessity  of  adopting  a  pagan 
morality  under  the  colour  of  a  Christian  dialec- 
tic ;  and  this  in  reality  was  the  work  of  the  Jesuit 
casuists.  It  is  easy  to  show  that  these  guides 
of  the  public  conscience  fell  into  sins  of  ignoble 
concession,  but  neither  can  it  be  denied  that 
at  bottom  they  brought  to  this  task  a  high  and 
religious  devotion.  We  must  never  forget, 
while  condemning  their  casuistic  accommoda- 
tion of  morals,  that  during  these  very  years  of 
their  unscrupulous  warfare  upon  Port- Royal 
other  Jesuits,  Jean  de  Brebeuf  and  his  followers, 
were,  for  the  same  glory  of  God,  laying  down 
their  lives  among  the  savages  of  the  Western 
World.  Parkman's  account  of  the  Jesuits 
in  North  America  is  a  fair  answer  to  many  of 
the  charges  in  the  Lettres  provinciates.  The 
cruelty  of  their  case  lay  in  the  fact  that  they 
dared  not  proclaim,  that  probably  they  did 
not  altogether  understand,  the  true  character 
of  their  operations.  It  was  not  only  a  sense 
of  guilt  that  made  them  writhe  under  the  terri- 
ble sarcasm  of  Pascal ;  many  of  them,  we  may 
believe,  felt  that  his  logic  was  exposing  to  the 


PASCAL  135 

world,  and  so  undermining,  the  compromise  by 
which  the  difficult  dominion  of  the  Church  and 
of  religion  was  upheld.  And  their  fears  were 
justified.  The  temporary  victory  was  to  the 
Jesuits,  but  in  the  end  no  single  book  has  done 
more  to  disorganise  Christianity  as  a  social 
power  than  these  Lettres  provinciates .  They 
have  made  the  name  of  Jesuit  for  ever  a  by- 
word and  a  synonym  of  dishonour;  they  have 
hastened  also  the  dissolution  of  the  Church. 

Having  finished  his  work  of  unmasking  the 
enemies,  as  he  conceived  them,  within  the  fold, 
Pascal  proposed  to  himself  to  set  aside  ten 
years  of  his  life  to  a  labour  of  construction — an 
elaborate  Apologie  of  the  faith  designed  primarily 
(though  not  exclusively)  for  the  conviction  of 
the  sceptics  without.  In  one  grand  argument 
he  was  to  convince  both  classes  of  men  of  the 
world  as  he  had  seen  them  represented  in  Miton 
and  Mere,  and  was  to  confute  the  two  schools  of 
philosophy  as  these  were  represented  to  him  by 
the  Epicurean  Gassendi  and  the  Stoic  Descartes. 
In  his  own  less  pedantic  and  more  human  way 
he  would  assert  the  truth  of  religion  against  the 
two  modes  of  infidelity  which  Cudworth  was 
to  belabour  so  resoundingly  as  atomical  and 
hylozoical  or  cosmoplastic  atheism.  "Every- 
thing is  Atheism,"  says  Blake,  "which  assumes 
the  reality  of  the  natural  and  unspiritual  world"; 
and  under  some  such  category  as  this  Pascal 


136  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

would  embrace  and  overwhelm  together  the 
ranks  of  scientific  rationalism  that  from  oppo- 
site sides,  but  with  the  same  goal  in  view, 
were  assaulting  the  stronghold  of  faith.  As 
his  Pensees  stand  actually  committed  to  paper, 
Descartes  was  the  enemy  whom  he  kept  almost 
constantly  in  mind,  for  the  reason  that  the 
immediate  danger  lay  from  that  quarter.  Not 
only  was  Descartes  the  leader  of  the  dom- 
inant movement  which  was  to  end  in  the  vic- 
torious rationalism  of  the  coming  years,  but 
his  doctrine  was  so  insidiously  framed  as  to 
seem  to  offer  a  religious  refuge  for  those  escaping 
from  epicurean  doubt.  There  were  elements  of 
his  philosophy  that  appealed  strongly  to  the 
Jansenists,  and  Pascal  himself  was  not  only  in 
his  earlier  scientific  years  a  disciple  of  Descartes 
but  in  certain  points  remained  always  faith- 
ful to  his  theories.  He  feared  and  repudiated 
the  subtlety  of  that  method  as  the  Trojans  hated 
the  treachery  of  the  Greeks  admitted  within 
their  walls. 

Now  the  Cartesian  system  assumes  three 
principles:  God  or  infinite  will,  thought  or 
reason,  and  extension  or  matter.  Between  the 
two  last,  i.  e.  thought  which  is  the  essential  nature 
of  man  and  extension  which  is  the  material 
world,  Descartes  saw  no  certain  bond  of  union; 
our  ideas  and  the  movements  of  space  are  two 
parallel    series    which    never    properly    meet. 


PASCAL  137 

So  harshly  was  this  division  carried  out  that 
animals,  as  not  partaking  in  rational  ideas, 
were  held  to  be  soulless  and  unfeeling  autom- 
atons. Yet,  from  a  religious  point  of  view 
Descartes'  error  was  not  the  sharpness  of  this 
division  but  its  denial  of  the  true  dualism;  for 
what,  after  all,  was  his  conception  of  the  ma- 
terial world  but  a  projection  outside  of  himself 
of  one  mode  of  intellection?  His  physics  was 
reduced  to  pure  mathematics;  but  number,  as 
he  admitted,  could  not  exist  apart  from  human 
thought.  And  human  thought  reduced  to  its 
essential  form  is  only  mathematics.  "  I  am 
consoled,"  he  says,  "that  they  connect  my 
metaphysic  with  pure  mathematics,  which 
above  all  I  desire  it  to  resemble."  His  two 
spheres  of  thought  and  extension  spring  thus 
from  the  same  cogito  ergo  sunt,  although  he  was 
never  able  to  discover  the  logical  bond  between 
reason  working  upon  itself  and  reason  pro- 
jecting itself  outward  as  a  world  of  represen- 
tation. By  making  of  the  material  universe  a 
mechanism,  to  be  explained  entirely  by  the 
mathematical  laws  of  movement  in  space, 
he  was  the  true  father  of  modern  science, — 
"  Give  me, "  he  exclaimed  hardily,  "  space  and 
movement,  and  I  will  construct  the  world." 
The  question  is  whether  his  rationalism  did 
not  reduce  human  nature  to  the  same  sort  of 
mechanism. 


138  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

It  might  be  answered  that,  although  these 
parallel  series  of  ideas  and  movements  are  no 
true  dualism  but  the  two  sides  of  the  same 
nature  conceived  mathematically,  yet  there 
remains  the  contrast  of  this  nature  with  the 
infinite  will,  which  is  God,  the  secret  source  of 
all  things.  Alas,  it  needed  no  Pascal  to  detect 
the  emptiness  of  this  profession  which  was  to 
supplant  the  old  faith.  God,  says  Descartes, 
must  exist  because  my  idea  of  him  is  perfectly 
clear  and  inevitable;  his  existence  is  a  corollary 
of  the  cogito  ergo  sum  just  as  absolutely  as  is 
that  of  ideas  or  of  extension,  and  he  is  just  as 
absolutely  a  product  of  the  same  faculty  of 
quantitative  reason.  The  three  realms  of  God, 
thought,  and  extension  are  thus  merely  different 
phases  of  natural  reason  and  have  the  same 
basis  of  reality.  The  same  basis,  yet  not  the  same 
degree.  For,  examined  more  narrowly,  how 
stands  it  with  this  Deity  who  is  nothing  more 
than  the  faculty  of  reason  considered  in  itself 
and  absolutely?  He  is  infinite  because  he  is 
without  content.  He  is  unfathomable,  incom- 
prehensible, unimaginable,  says  Descartes:  so 
he  was,  indeed,  to  the  Hindu;  so  he  was  to 
St.  Augustine;  and  so,  on  the  other  hand,  to 
Herbert  Spencer  he  shall  be  the  great  Unknow- 
able. The  infinite,  in  a  word,  may  surpass 
understanding  either  because  it  is  the  supreme 
Yes  or  the  supreme  No,  and  to  Descartes,  when 


PASCAL  139 

we  strip  away  his  metaphysical  subterfuge,  it 
was  the  everlasting  denial.  Kant  was  not  in 
error  when  he  said  of  this  aspect  of  Cartes- 
ianism:  "With  simple  ideas  we  are  no  more 
made  rich  in  knowledge  than  a  merchant  would 
be  in  money,  if,  with  the  intention  of  increasing 
his  fortune,  he  should  add  several  zeros  to  his 
cash  account."  In  practice  God  to  Descartes 
was  a  zero.  He  excluded  Deity  from  the  phy- 
sical world  by  denying  final  causes;  he  left  no 
place  for  Deity  in  his  system  of  ethics;  he  made 
a  complete  separation  of  theology  and  practical 
philosophy,  treating  the  former  with  the  verbal 
respect  of  indifference  and  to  the  latter  devoting 
his  whole  life ;  he  reduced  the  idea  of  the  infinite 
to  an  empty  phrase  by  using  it  to  rebuke  the 
pr^somption  impertinente  par  laquelle  on  vent 
etre  du  conseil  de  Dieu  et  prendre  avec  ltd  la 
charge  de  conduire  le  nionde.  The  real  influence 
of  this  philosophy,  as  M.  Brunetiere  has  shown 
so  convincingly,  came  with  the  deism  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  As  St.  Augustine  was 
seduced  by  the  apparent  dualism  of  Mani  but 
left  it  for  a  faith  rooted  more  deeply  in  the 
heart  of  human  experience,  so  Pascal  turned 
from  Descartes  to  that  imperthient  presumption 
which  should  make  him  one  with  the  eternal  God. 
Pascal's  great  literary  design  was,  we  know, 
never  completed.  Instead  of  a  formal  Apologia 
we  have  only  a  collection  of  incoherent  Pensees, 


I40  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

sometimes  jotted  down  roughly  or  dictated,  at 
other  times  elaborated  with  minute  care,  during 
his  last  four  years  of  broken  health — pendent 
opera  interrupta,  as  his  friends  wrote  for  an 
epigraph  when  they  gave  the  pathetic  remains 
to  the  world.  1  The  interruption  of  that  work 
by  death  is  often  regarded  as  one  of  the  supreme 
losses  of  philosophy,  yet  we  may  comfort  our- 
selves by  believing  that  the  Pensees  have  a 
living  value  of  their  own  which  might  have 
been  smothered  in  the  finished  Apologie.  There 
is  reason  to  fear  that  no  amount  of  literary 
skill  could  have  saved  from  the  general  fate 
Pascal's  argument  for  Christianity  through 
prophecy  and  miracles,  which  he  evidently 
meant  to  draw  out  at  considerable  length.  He 
could  have  written  only  from  the  insufficient 
knowledge  of  his  day,  and  at  best  his  appeal 
to  the  religious  instinct  would  have  been  dulled 
by  association  with  so  much  deciduous  matter. 
And  there  is  a  further  weakness  still  more 
essential    to    his    plan.     Granted    that    Grace 

1  I  have  followed  Brunschvicg's  Pensees  et  opuscules 
(third  edition,  1904),  which  reproduces  the  actual  text, 
but  groups  the  Pensees  under  heads.  Brunschvicg's 
volume  is  a  model  piece  of  editing.  By  printing  the 
minor  works  and  Pensees  in  chronological  sequence, 
provided  with  Introductions  and  imbedded,  so  to 
speak,  in  a  biographical  narrative,  he  has  displayed 
the  development  of  Pascal's  inner  life  in  a  manner 
which  can  excite  only  admiration. 


PASCAL  141 

comes  from  above,  descending  upon  whomsoever 
it  will  and  leaving  others  to  destruction,  granted 
that  salvation  is  the  act  of  God  and  not  of  man, 
to  what  end  is  all  this  human  argumentation? 
It  is  evident  from  a  number  of  the  thoughts 
that  Pascal  himself  was  aware  of  this  funda- 
mental paradox  and  strove  by  all  the  subtlety 
of  his  intellect  to  circumvent  it.  The  result  is 
a  number  of  admirable  reflections  on  rhetoric 
and  the  art  of  persuasion,  but  it  cannot  be 
honestly  said  that  the  philosophic  difficulty 
is  removed  or  even  quite  frankly  stated.  These 
weaknesses,  we  may  fear,  would  have  been 
integral  to  the  Apologie  and  would  have  done 
much  to  lessen  its  permanent  human  interest. 
But  with  the  Pensees  as  they  stand  the  case  is 
different.  Here  there  is  no  connected  tissue  of 
argument,  nothing  to  hinder  us  in  separating 
the  purely  religious  design  from  all  that  intellect- 
ual scaffolding  of  the  age,  and  in  setting  forth 
the  nobility  of  its  unencumbered  outlines. 

The  introduction  to  his  theme,  as  we  know 
from  the  tradition  of  Port- Royal,  was  to  have 
been  a  portrait  of  naked  humanity,  even  to  the 
laying  bare  of  the  most  secret  movements  of 
the  heart.  And  from  the  fragments  preserved 
it  is  not  difficult  to  discover  what  would  have 
been  the  manner  and  the  object  of  his  analysis. 
Against  the  self-satisfied  science  of  the  day, 
with  its  theory  of  reason  and  matter,  he  would 


142  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

have  thrown  into  light  the  futility  of  attempting 
to  explain  by  any  such  facile  dualism  the  facts 
of  man's  experience.     He  would  have  repeated, 
as  indeed  he  has  partly  repeated,  the  arguments 
of  the  Dialogue  with  M.  de  Saci,  which  show 
how  both  these  terms  are  still  within  nature 
and  how  in  the  end  rationalism  and  indifference 
are  confounded  together  in  the  same  engulfing 
uncertainties    of    doubt:     "There    is    nothing 
so   conformable    to   reason   as    this    disavowal 
of  reason.   .   .   .   The  truth  is  in  Pyrrhonism." 
So  far  he  would  have  stood  with  Montaigne 
and  his  worldly  friend  M.  Miton,  against  the 
pride  of  deism  and  of  atheistic  science.      But 
in  our  very  perception  of  this  abasement  he 
would  have  discovered  evidence  of  the  veritable 
chasm   between   the    natural    and    the    divine, 
thus  carrying  the  Socratic  paradox  to  its  highest 
point.     He  would  have  heaped  scorn  upon  those 
who,   at   once  seeing  and  waiving  the   higher 
dualism,  placed  God  and  religion  in  the  empty 
sphere    of    the     unknowable    so    far    sundered 
from  this  world  as  to  have  no  meaning  for  us: 
"  I   cannot   forgive   Descartes ;   he   might   very 
well  have  undertaken  in  all  his  philosophy  to 
dispense  with  God;  but  he  could  not  abstain 
from  having  Him  give  the  world  a  fillip  to  set 
it  in  motion;  after  which  he  has  no  more  concern 
with    God."     On    the    contrary    the    office    of 
religion,  he  would  have  asserted,  is  just  to  make 


PASCAL  143 

of  this  higher  dualism  the  one  serious  concern 
of  life  and  so  to  lift  the  soul  out  of  its  baleful 
web:  "For  Christian  faith  scarcely  looks  be- 
yond the  establishing  of  these  two  things:  the 
corruption  of  nature,  and  the  redemption  of 
Jesus  Christ."  And  if  he  then  purposed  to  prove 
that  the  religious  instinct  has  no  sure  support 
outside  of  the  circle  of  Catholic  dogma,  we 
might,  perhaps,  at  this  point  have  parted  from 
him  in  sadness  and  in  humility;  or  we  might 
have  stayed  with  him,  in  the  assurance  that  at 
least  we  should  find  satisfaction  for  the  imagi- 
nation in  his  unfolding  of  that  sublime  sym- 
bolism which  for  so  many  centuries  was  able, 
and  still  is  able  for  so  many  believers,  to  speak 
comfort  to  the  deepest  needs  of  the  heart. 

It  is  impossible  within  the  limits  of  an  essay 
to  follow  with  quotations  the  ample  course  of 
his  argument  as  this  suggests  itself  to  an  atten- 
tive study  of  the  book;  it  will  be  sufficient,  as 
indeed  it  is  safer,  to  bring  together  a  few  of  the 
reflections  that  display  him  at  the  heights  of 
his  theme : 

From  this  point  should  begin  the  chapter  on  the 
powers  of  deceit.  Man  is  but  a  subject  full  of  error 
that  is  natural  and  ineffaceable  without  Grace.  No- 
thing shows  him  the  truth.  Everything  abuses  him; 
those  two  principles  of  truth,  reason  and  the  senses, 
are  not  only  each  in  itself  lacking  in  sincerity  but  abuse 
each  other  reciprocally.  The  senses  abuse  the  reason 
by  false  appearances;  and  this  same  trickery  which 


144  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

they  bring  to  reason  they  receive  from  her  in  turn: 
she  has  her  revenge. 

Thereupon  follow  the  particular  sources  of 
error,  such  as  the  passions,  the  complexion  of 
the  body,  sickness,  and  the  like;  including  the 
worldly  imagination: 

This  arrogant  power,  enemy  of  reason,  which  takes 
pleasure  in  controlling  and  dominating  reason  in  order 
to  display  her  puissance  in  all  things,  has  established 
in  man  a  second  nature.  Through  her  men  are  happy 
or  unhappy,  well  or  sick,  rich  or  poor;  she  makes  us 
believe,  doubt,  deny  reason;  she  suspends  the  senses, 
she  makes  thera  feel;  she  has  her  madmen  and  her 
sages.  .  .  .  Who  dispenses  reputation?  who  gives  re- 
spect and  veneration  to  persons,  works,  laws,  to  the 
great,  if  not  this  faculty  of  the  imagination?  How 
insufficient  are  all  the  riches  of  the  earth  without  her 
consent! 

All  is  one,  all  is  diverse.  How  many  natures  in  the 
nature  of  man!  how  many  vocations! 

Condition  of  man:  inconstancy,  ennui,  restlessness.' 

Our  nature  is  in  movement;  perfect  repose  is  death. 

Nothing  is  so  insupportable  to  man  as  to  be  in  full 
repose,  without  passions,  without  business,  without 
diversion,  without  application.  He  feels  then  his 
nothingness,  his  destitution,  his  insufficiency,  his  de- 
pendence, his  feebleness,  his  emptiness.  Immediately 
there  arise  from  the  depths  of  his  soul  ennui,  gloom, 
sadness,  peevishness,  vexation,  despair. 

When  at  times  I  set  myself  to  consider  the  various 
things  that  agitate  men,  and  the  perils  and  pains  to 


PASCAL  145 

which  men  expose  themselves  at  court,  in  war,  whence 
arise  so  many  quarrels,  passions,  rash  and  often  wicked 
enterprises,  etc.,  I  perceive  that  all  the  unhappiness 
of  men  comes  from  a  single  source,  that  they  do  not 
know  how  to  stay  in  repose,  in  a  room.  ...  So  it 
happens  that  men  love  noise  and  bustle;  that  im- 
prisonment is  so  terrible  a  torture;  that  the  pleasure  of 
solitude  is  a  thing  incomprehensible.  And  this,  in 
a  word,  is  the  greatest  source  of  felicity  in  the  estate 
of  kings,  that  men  are  always  trying  to  divert  them 
and  procure  for  them  all  kinds  of  pleasures.  The 
king  is  surrounded  by  people  who  think  only  of  divert- 
ing him  and  preventing  him  from  thinking  of  himself. 
For  he  is  unhappy,  king  though  he  be,  if  he  thinks  of 
himself.  .  .  .  Here  then  is  all  that  men  have  been  able 
to  contrive  to  render  themselves  happy.  And  those  who 
play  the  philosopher  on  this  head,  and  who  believe  that 
people  are  unreasonable  to  pass  the  whole  day  running 
after  a  hare  which  they  would  n't  have  at  a  bargain, 
know  little  of  our  nature.  This  hare  would  not  guaran- 
tee us  against  the  sight  of  death  and  misery,  but  the 
chase — which  turns  us  aside — does  guarantee  us 
against  them.  ,  .  .  [Men]  have  a  secret  instinct  which 
leads  them  to  seek  diversion  and  occupation  outside  of 
themselves,  springing  from  the  sense  of  their  continual 
miseries;  and  they  have  another  secret  instinct,  re- 
maining from  the  greatness  of  our  original  nature,  by 
which  they  know  that  in  reality  happiness  is  only  in 
repose  and  not  in  the  tumult;  and  from  these  two 
contrary  instincts  there  is  formed  within  them  a  con- 
fused purpose,  hidden  from  sight  in  the  depths  of  their 
soul,  which  leads  them  to  tend  toward  repose  by 
agitation,  and  to  fancy  that  the  satisfaction  they  miss 
will  come  to  them  if,  by  surmounting  certain  dif- 
ficulties they  have  in  view,  they  can  thereby  open  to 
themselves  the  door  to  repose. 
10 


146  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

In  such  words  as  these  lies  the  reply  to  the 
boast  of  Voltaire,  speaking  for  his  age  and  for 
ours:  "I  dare  to  take  the  part  of  humanity 
against  this  sublime  misanthrope;  I  dare  to 
assert  that  we  are  neither  so  evil  nor  so  wretched 
as  he  says."  From  the  point  of  view  of  com- 
mon sense,  from  the  feelings  of  the  man  absorbed 
in  the  tumult  of  diversion  and  business,  Voltaire 
is  right,  and  Pascal  himself  admits  as  much. 
But  there  is  another  point  of  view,  and  when 
once  the  inner  eye  has  been  opened  to  this  aspect 
of  life,  though  it  catch  but  a  glimpse  of  that 
vision  and  close  again  to  its  own  night,  the  words 
of  Voltaire  seem  but  the  language  of  one  born 
blind.  When  once  the  sting  of  eternity  has 
entered  the  heart,  and  the  desire  to  behold 
things  sub  specie  ceternitatis,  when  once  the 
thirst  of  stability  and  repose  has  been  felt,  for 
that  soul  there  is  no  longer  content  in  the  diver- 
sions of  life,  and,  try  as  he  will  to  conceal  to 
himself  the  truth,  with  every  pleasure  and  amid 
every  distraction  he  tastes  the  clinging  drop  of 
bitterness.  Henceforth,  in  the  midst  of  enjoy- 
ment, he  knows,  with  Pascal,  how  "  horrible 
a  thing  it  is  to  feel  slip  away  all  that  one  pos- 
sesses"; and  he  cannot  forget  that  "the  last 
act  is  bloody,  however  fair  all  the  rest  of  the 
comedy;  in  the  end  we  throw  a  little  earth  on 
the  head,  and  it  is  over  for  ever."  It  is  not 
exaggeration  to  say  that  the  consciousness  or/' 


PASCAL  147 

unconsciousness  of  this  dualism  is  the  most  fund- 
amental mark  of  division  among  men.  Herein 
lies  the  distinction  between  civilisations,  between 
faith  and  reason,  between  religion  and  ration- 
alism, between  piety  and  morality,  between 
genius  and  talent.  The  stoic  deism  of  the 
eighteenth  century  was  singularly  blind  to  this 
dualism,  and  the  science  of  the  nineteenth 
belongs  in  this  respect  to  the  same  school.  The 
step  from  Epicurean  scepticism  to  insight  is 
easier  than  from  these,  for  the  Epicurean  at 
least  is  not  lapped  in  the  illusion  of  the  stability 
of  nature.  So  we  are  not  surprised  to  see  Pascal 
carrying  the  philosophy  of  his  friend  Miton 
with  him  into  the  cloister,  or  to  discover  Mon- 
taigne's constant  preoccupation  with  the  thought 
of  death;  and  we  can  understand  how  Lucretius 
may  be  read  as  one  of  the  prophets  inspired 
against  his  will. 

But  to  return  to  Pascal : 

I  know  not  who  has  placed  nie  in  the  world  [he 
says,  speaking  for  the  infidel],  or  what  the  world  is, 
or  I  myself  am;  I  am  in  a  terrible  ignorance  of  all 
things;  I  know  not  what  my  body  is,  or  my  senses,  or 
my  soul  and  this  very  part  of  me  which  thinks  what  I 
am  saying,  which  reflects  on  everything  and  on  itself, 
and  knows  itself  no  more  than  the  rest.  I  see  these 
fearful  spaces  of  the  universe  which  encompass  me, 
and  I  find  myself  attached  to  a  corner  of  this  vast 
expanse,  without  knowing  why  I  am  set  in  this  place 
rather  than  in  another,  or  why  this  little  time  that 


148  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

is  given  me  to  live  has  been  assigned  to  me  at  this 
point  rather  than  at  any  other  out  of  all  the  eternity 
that  has  preceded  me  and  all  that  shall  follow  me. 
Everywhere  I  see  only  infinities  which  encompass  me 
as  an  atom  and  as  a  shade  that  endures  but  an  instant 
without  return.  All  that  I  know  is  that  I  must  soon 
die,  but  most  of  all  I  am  ignorant  of  this  very  death 
which  I  cannot  escape. 

He  who  shall  thus  reflect  upon  his  estate  will  be 
terrified  at  himself,  and,  considering  how  he  is  sup- 
ported in  the  mass  which  nature  has  given  him,  between 
these  two  abysms  of  infinity  and  nothingness,  he  will 
tremble  at  the  view  of  these  marvels;  I  believe  that, 
"his  curiosity  changing  into  wonder,  he  will  be  more  dis- 
posed to  contemplate  them  in  silence  than  to  examine 
into  them  with  presumption.  For,  after  all,  what  is 
man  in  nature?  A  nothing  in  regard  to  the  infinite, 
an  all  in  regard  to  nothingness,  a  mean  between  nothing 
and  all.  Infinitely  removed  from  comprehending  the 
extremes,  the  end  of  things  and  their  source  are  for 
him   insuperably   hidden   in    an   impenetrable   secret; 

Jie  is  equally  incapable  of  seeing  the  nothing  from 
/hich  he  is  drawn,  and  the  infinite  in  which  he  is 
wallowed  up.  .  .  .  Such  is  our  true  estate;  it  is  this 
■jvhich  makes  us  incapable  of  knowing  certainly  and 
of  ignoring  absolutely.  We  sail  upon  a  vast  medium, 
always  uncertain  and  floating,  pushed  from  one  side  to 
the  other.  To  whatever  end  we  thought  to  attach  our- 
selves and  find  rest,  it  starts,  and  leaves  us;  and  if  we 
follow  it,  it  slips  from  our  grasp,  glides  from  us  and  flees 
in  an  eternal  flight.  Nothing  pauses  for  us.  It  is  the 
estate  natural  to  us,  and  yet  the  most  contrary  to  our 
inclination;  we  burn  with  the  desire  to  find  a  firm  sup- 
port, and  a  last  unshaken  base  on  which  to  build  a 
tower  that  shall  rise  to  the  infinite,  but  all  our  foun- 
dation cracks,  and  the  earth  opens  even  to  the  abysm. 


PASCAL  149 

The  eternal  silence  of  these  infinite  spaces  fills  me 
with  fear. 

We  arrive  at  the  cardinal  point.  From  the 
uncertainty  of  the  reason  and  of  the  senses 
Pascal  turns  to  another  faculty  which  he  calls 
"the  heart,"  although  he  means  by  this  not 
the  emotional  faculty  alone,  but  reason  and 
emotion  together,  the  spirit  of  intention  which 
is  faith: 

The  heart  has  its  reasons,  which  the  reason  does 
not  know. 

The  greatness  of  man  is  great  in  this,  that  he  knows 
himself  miserable. 

Despite  the  view  of  all  our  miseries,  which  touch  us, 
which  hold  us  by  the  throat,  we  have  an  instinct  which 
we  cannot  repress,  which  lifts  us  up. 

The  greatness  of  man  is  so  visible  that  it  springs 
up  even  from  his  misery.  For  that  which  is  nature 
in  animals  we  call  misery  in  men;  whence  we  perceive 
that  our  natixre,  being  to-day  like  that  of  animals,  has 
fallen  from  a  better  nature  which  belonged  to  us  at 
another  time. 

All  these  contrarieties,  which  seem  to  remove  me 
furthest  from  the  knowledge  of  religion,  are  really 
what  has  led  me  most  quickly  to  the  true  religion. 

The  greatness  and  the  misery  of  man  being  so  visible, 
the  true  religion  must  necessarily  teach  us  that  there 
is  some  great  principle  of  greatness  in  man,  and  that 
there  is  a  great  principle  of  misery.  It  must  therefore 
give  us  a  reason  for  these  astonishing  contrarieties. 


150  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

What  astonishing  thing,  nevertheless,  that  the 
mystery  furthest  removed  from  our  understanding, 
to  wit,  the  transmission  of  sin,  is  a  thing  without  which 
■ype  can  have  no  understanding  of  ourselves!  For 
undoubtedly  there  is  nothing  which  more  shocks  our 
ireason  than  to  say  that  the  sin  of  the  first  man  has 
/rendered  guilty  those  who,  being  so  remote  from  this 
/source,  seem  incapable  of  participating  in  it.  This 
transmission  not  only  appears  impossible  to  us,  it  seems 
also  very  unjust;  for  what  is  there  more  contrary  to 
the  rules  of  our  miserable  justice  than  to  damn  eternally 
an  infant  incapable  of  will,  for  a  sin  in  which  he  ap- 
pears to  have  so  little  share  that  it  was  committed  six 
thousand  years  before  he  existed?  Certainly  nothing 
disconcerts  us  more  rudely  than  this  doctrine;  and 
yet,  without  this  mystery,  the  most  incomprehensible 
of  all,  we  are  incomprehensible  to  ourselves. 

In  thus  frankly  stating  the  unreasonableness 
of  the  doctrine  of  original  sin,  while  maintain- 
ing so  stalwartly  the  mystery  of  our  nature  on 
which  that  doctrine  is  based,  Pascal  comes 
surprisingly  near  the  philosophy  of  the  Hindus. 
It  needs  but  a  slight  shifting  of  view  to  change 
the  Christian  dogma,  thus  presented,  into  the 
theory  of  illusion,  i.  e.,  to  say  that  our  ignorance 
(avidyd)  of  the  relation  between  the  evil  in  our 
nature  and  our  higher,  judging  Self  is,  so  far  as 
we  are  concerned,  the  cause  of  the  existence 
of  that  evil.  In  such  of  the  Pensees  as  this, 
and  as  those  that  follow,  we  get  sight  of  the 
foundation  of  absolute  human  experience  on 
which  the  Christian  imagination  has  raised  its 


PASCAL  151 

Splendid   and   awful,  but   insubstantial,    struc- 
ture: 

The  I  is  hateful. 

It  is  right  to  love  only  God  and  to  hate  only  oneself. 

The  true  and  only  virtue  then  is  to  hate  oneself, 
(for  one  is  hateful  by  reason  of  concupiscence),  and  to 
seek  a  being  veritably  lovable  for  one's  love.  But, 
as  we  cannot  love  that  which  is  outside  of  us,  it  is 
necessary  to  love  a  being  who  is  within  us,  and  who 
is  not  we,  and  this  holds  true  of  every  man.  Now, 
there  is  none  but  the  universal  Being  who  is  such  an 
one.  The  kingdom  of  God  is  within  us:  the  universal 
good  is  within  us,  is  ourselves,  and  is  not  we. 

Is  it  necessary  to  point  out  how  this  mystery 
of  the  eternal  Being,  which  is  at  once  we  and  not 
we,  set  over  against  the  hateful  /,  trembles,  so 
to  speak,  on  the  verge  of  passing  into  the  Hindu 
doctrine  of  the  two  selves? 

But  let  them  conclude  what  they  will  against  deism, 
they  shall  not  conclude  anything  against  the  Christian 
religion,  which  consists  properly  in  the  mystery  of  the 
Redeemer,  who,  uniting  in  himself  the  two  natures, 
human  and  divine,  has  drawn  men  out  of  the  corruption 
of  sin  in  order  to  reconcile  them  to  God  in  his  divine 
person.  It  teaches  men  therefore  at  once  these  two 
truths:  that  there  is  a  God,  of  whoin  men  are  capable, 
and  that  there  is  a  corruption  in  nature  which  renders 
them  unworthy  of  Him.  It  is  equally  important  to 
men  to  know  the  one  and  the  other  of  these  facts;  and 
it  is  equally  dangerous  to  a  man  to  know  God  without 
knowing  his  misery,  or  to  know  his  misery  without 


152  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

knowing  the  Redeemer  who  can  heal  him  of  it.  The 
knowledge  of  one  of  these  points  alone  makes  either 
the  pride  of  the  philosophers  who  have  known  God 
and  not  their  misery,  or  the  despair  of  the  atheists  who 
know  their  misery  without  a  Redeemer. 

So  far  we  may  follow  the  logic  of  Pascal. 
There  remains  the  rapture  of  his  faith  in  the 
Redeemer,  hinted  in  scattered  reflections  and 
expressed  more  expansively  in  the  meditation 
which  he  entitled  The  Mystery  of  Jesus.  The 
emotion  of  that  Mystery  has  just  a  taint  of  the 
morbidness,  so  it  seems  to  us,  commonly  associ- 
ated with  the  cloister,  but  the  idea  at  bottom 
is  the  same  as  that  which  he  had  developed  so 
magnificently  in  the  Prayer  written  after  his 
first  conversion:  "O  my  God,  how  happy  is 
the  soul  of  whom  thou  art  the  delight,  since  it 
can  abandon  itself  to  love  thee,  not  only  with- 
out scruple  but  with  merit!  How  firm  and 
lasting  is  its  joy,  since  its  endeavour  shall  not 
be  made  vain;  for  thou  shalt  never  suffer  de- 
struction, and  never  shall  life  or  death  separate 
it  from  the  object  of  its  desires!" 

The  end  came  to  Pascal,  after  much  suffering, 
the  19  August,  1662,  in  his  fortieth  year;  his 
last  words  in  his  agony  were  these:  "May  God 
never  forsake  me!"  Sickness  and  death  frus- 
trated his  noble  design  of  constructing  an  argu- 
ment which  should  render  infidelity  forever 
unreasonable,  but  from  the  salvage  of  his  broken 


PASCAL  1 53 

meditations  has  been  made  this  little  book  of 
Pensees,  almost  pure  gold.  Here,  if  we  look 
for  the  wisdom  of  this  world,  is  a  wealth  of 
observations  on  the  ways  of  mankind,  for,  it  is 
to  be  remembered,  Pascal  was  to  the  end  honnete 
homme  as  well  as  saint.  Here,  more  essentially, 
we  may  find  the  intuitive  utterances  of  faith, 
coloured  indeed  but  not  overlaid  by  the  associ- 
ations of  mediaeval  theology.  Here ,  if  anywhere , 
Christianity  rises  into  the  thin,  intoxicating 
atmosphere  of  pure  religion.  There  has  been 
no  such  expression  of  reasoned  faith  from  his 
day  to  ours. 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE 

With  the  din  of  battles  and  marchings  in 
our  ears,  with  the  wrangle  of  plots  and  counter- 
plots worrying  our  memory,  it  is  hard  to  realise 
the  uneventful  life  of  a  provincial  physician, 
like  that  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  during  the 
Civil  War  and  the  Commonwealth;  so  easily 
deafened  are  we  by  the  clamour  of  history.  He 
was  born  in  London,  19  October,  1605,  his 
father  being  a  mercer  in  the  parish  of  St.  Michael- 
le-Quem.  His  education  was  at  Winchester, 
where  he  was  admitted  as  a  scholar  in  16 16, 
and  at  Broadgates  Hall,  Oxford,  Dr.  Johnson's 
college  (afterwards  called  Pembroke),  where  he 
was  matriculated  as  fellow-commoner  in  1623. 
He  obtained  the  bachelor's  degree  in  1626,  and 
proceeded  master  three  years  later.  Soon  after 
this  he  is  on  the  Continent,  studying  at  the 
famous  medical  schools  of  Montpellier  and 
Padua,  and  completing  his  course  at  Leyden, 
where  the  new  chemical  therapeutics  was 
taught  by  the  celebrated  Van  Helmont,  in 
opposition  to  the  botanical  method  still  in 
vogue  among  the  Italians.     In   1633   we  find 

154 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  I  55 

him  back  in  England,  established  at  Halifax  in 
Yorkshire.  Four  years  later,  at  the  invitation 
of  friends,  he  transfers  his  practice  to  Norwich, 
and  in  this  Norfolk  home  the  remainder  of  his 
life  flows  busily  and  prosperously.  He  had  in 
his  youth  written  rather  scornfully  of  matri- 
mony: "I  never  yet  cast  a  true  affection  on  a 
woman,  but  I  have  loved  my  friend  as  I  do 
virtue,  my  soul,  my  God" — and  worse  than 
that;  but  in  1641  he  married  a  woman  who 
appears  to  have  been  as  notable  a  housewife 
and  as  devoted  a  mother  as  she  was  eccentric 
in  spelling.  Of  their  ten  (or  eleven)  children, 
four  lived  to  a  considerable  age;  one,  Edward, 
became  a  famous  traveller,  a  popular  London 
physician,  and  a  member  of  the  Royal  Society. 
The  correspondence  that  passed  between  this 
son  and  the  father  is  preserved  in  part,  and  is 
as  honourable  to  the  learning  as  to  the  character 
of  both.  In  167 1  King  Charles,  then  in  Norwich, 
knighted  the  father  as  the  most  distinguished 
citizen  of  the  town.  Eleven  years  later,  at 
the  age  of  seventy-seven,  on  his  birthday,  our 
erudite  and  kindly  physician  went  to  his  rest — 
but  not  "to  the  iniquity  of  oblivion." 

He  was  in  a  way  but  an  amateur  author,  and 
his  first  book  was  printed  without  his  consent; 
yet  there  is  no  writer  of  English  prose  whose 
name  has  greater  assurance  of  that  immortality 
of  fame  he  mocked  at,  and  whose  eloquence  is 


156  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

more  certain  to  be  remembered  among  the 
"wild  enormities  of  ancient  magnanimity." 
Before  coming  to  Norwich  he  had  for  his  own 
pleasure  written  out  his  meditations  on  the 
problem  of  science  and  religion  which  was  then 
troubling  the  conscience  of  men,  and  the  manu- 
script book,  after  the  fashion  of  the  day,  had 
been  lent  among  his  friends  and  occasionally 
transcribed.  One  of  these  copies  fell  into  the 
hands  of  Andrew  Crooke,  a  London  publisher, 
who  in  1642  issued  it  piratically  as  the  Religio 
Medici.  Now  happens  a  curious  incident  in 
the  book-world  of  that  age,  told  with  great  gusto 
by  Mr.  Edmund  Gosse  in  his  life  of  the  author. 
Sir  Kenelm  Digby,  the  eccentric  philosopher 
who  may  be  likened  to  Browne  himself  with  a 
strong  tinge  of  charlatanism  added,  was  then 
for  political  reasons  confined  in  Winchester 
House.  There,  late  one  evening,  he  received 
a  letter  from  Lord  Dorset  recommending  the 
newly  published  treatise.  Without  delay  he 
sent  out  for  a  copy,  and  the  next  morning 
reported  on  the  work  to  his  friend: 

This  good-natured  creature  [Religio  Medici]  I  could 
easily  persuade  to  be  my  bedfellow,  and  to  wake  with 
me  as  long  as  I  had  any  edge  to  entertain  myself 
with  the  delights  I  sucked  from  so  noble  a  conversation. 
And  truly,  my  Lord,  I  closed  not  my  eyes  till  I  had 
enriched  myself  with,  or  at  least  exactly  surveyed, 
all  the  treasures  that  are  lapped  up  in  the  folds  of 
these  few  sheets. 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  I  57 

Not  content  with  expressing  his  enthusiasm 
thus  privately,  Sir  Kenelm  set  himself  immedi- 
ately to  write  and  afterwards  to  publish  an 
elaborate  critique  of  the  work.  On  hearing 
of  this  project  Browne  wrote  to  him,  saying 
that  the  book  had  been  printed  surreptitiously 
and  was  full  of  errors,  and  begging  him  to  hold 
back  his  criticism  until  a  correct  impression 
could  be  got  out.  This  authorised  text  was 
issued  by  Crooke  in  1643.  Its  effect  was  ex- 
traordinary. There  were  at  least  fourteen 
editions  printed  during  the  author's  lifetime, 
not  to  mention  the  discussions,  favourable  and 
hostile,  it  provoked.  Twice  it  was  translated 
into  Latin  and  thus  attracted  much  attention 
among  Continental  scholars.  As  early  as  1644, 
Guy  Patin,  the  witty  physician  of  Paris,  was 
celebrating  it  in  letters  to  his  friends ; 

Un  petit  livre  nouveau  intitule  Religio  Medici  fait 
par  un  Anglais  et  traduit  en  Latin  par  quelque  Hol- 
landais.  C  est  un  livre  tout  gentil  et  curieux,  mais 
fort  delicat  et  tout  mystique;  1'  auteur  ne  manque 
pas  d'esprit;  vous  y  verrez  d'  6tranges  et  ravissantes 
pensees.     II  n'y  a  encore  gu^re  de  livres  de  cette  sorte. 

Browne's  next  work,  the  Pseudodoxia  Epi- 
demica  or  Vulgar  Errors  (published  in  1648), 
was  an  attempt,  half-hearted  it  must  be  said, 
to  apply  the  new  scientific  methods  to  the  in- 
veterate superstitions  about  animals,  plants, 
and  stones  that  had  originated  for  the  most 


158  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

part  in  some  hoary  antiquity,  had  been  gathered 
together  in  Pliny's  Natural  History  and  so  trans- 
mitted through  the  Middle  Ages,  and  had  taken 
on  fresh  vitality  with  the  euphuistic  move- 
ment of  the  Renaissance.  Nothing  followed 
this  treatise  for  ten  years,  when  there  appeared 
in  a  single  volume  his  Hydriotaphia,  a  mystical 
rhapsody  on  death  suggested  by  the  unearthing 
of  a  number  of  burial  urns  at  Old  Walsingham, 
and  The  Garden  of  Cyrus,  which,  beginning 
with  Xenophon's  description  of  trees  laid  out 
in  groups  of  five  like  the  figure  X  (!'.),  goes 
on,  as  Coleridge  said,  to  find  "quincunxes  in 
heaven  above,  quincunxes  on  earth  below,  quin- 
cunxes in  the  mind  of  man,  quincunxes  in 
tones,  in  optic  nerves,  in  roots  of  trees,  in  leaves, 
in  everything."  This  Cyrus-Garden  is,  in  fact, 
about  as  nondescript  a  piece  of  Pythagorean 
madness  as  ever  bewildered  the  wits  of  man; 
yet  even  here,  lost  in  a  quincuncial  labyrinth  of 
words,  there  are  wandering  snatches  of  Browne's 
entrancing  music,  as  in  that  paragraph  on  the 
adumbrations  of  religion,  or  in  that  other  which 
explains  why  "Providence  hath  arched  and 
paved  the  great  house  of  the  world  with  colours 
of  mediocrity. "  And  the  conclusion,  who  shall 
forget  it? — written  down,  we  fondly  suppose, 
when  the  author,  rising  from  his  finished  manu- 
script, looked  out  at  the  stars  that  were  never 
far   from   his    thoughts,    and   beheld    the    five 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  159 

faintly  glimmering  Hyades  now  at  midnight 
dropping  toward  the  horizon: 

But  the  Quincunx  of  Heaven  runs  low,  and  'tis 
time  to  close  the  five  ports  of  knowledge;  We  are  un- 
willing to  spin  out  our  awaking  thoughts  into  the 
phantasms  of  sleep,  which  often  continueth  precogi- 
tations;  making  Cables  of  Cobwebs  and  Wildernesses 
of  handsome  Groves.  .  .  .  Though  Somnus  in  Homer 
be  sent  to  rouse  up  Agamemnon,  I  find  no  such  effects 
in  the  drowsy  approaches  of  sleep.  To  keep  our  eyes 
open  longer  were  but  to  act  our  Antipodes.  The  Hunts- 
m^en  are  up  in  America,  and  they  are  already  past  their 
first  sleep  in  Persia.  But  who  can  be  drowsy  at  that 
hour  which  freed  us  from  everlasting  sleep?  or  have 
slumbering  thoughts  at  that  time,  when  sleep  itself 
must  end,  and  as  some  conjecture  all  shall  awake 
again  ? 

It  is  this  swift  extravagance  of  analogy  that 
never  fails  to  stir  our  sleeping  faculties  of  won- 
der, however  often  we  return  to  Sir  Thomas 
Browne.  In  his  books,  as  on  the  stage  of  Faust, 
the  imagination  is  a  winged  thing  to  which  space 
and  time  are  a  jest : 

So  shreitet  in  dem  engen  Bretterhaus 
Den  ganzen  Kreis  der  Schopfung  aus. 

After  this  volume  of  1658  there  was  silence 
until  his  death.  Then  a  number  of  his  miscel- 
laneous tracts  and  letters  were  published  post- 
humously, but  among  them  nothing  of  great 
interest    save    the    lingeringly-cadenced    Letter 


l6o  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

to  a  Friend,  with  its  ecstatic  pathos,  and  the 
paragraphs  collected  under  the  title  of  Christian 
Morals,  grave  with  an  old  man's  warnings  from 
"the  pedagogy  of  example,"  wavering  between 
admiration  of  "this  courtly  and  splendid  world" 
and  amazement  to  behold  its  inhabitants  in 
their  "haste  or  bustle  unto  ruin." 

More  than  most  writers  Sir  Thomas  Browne 
was  influenced  by  a  single  idea  dominant  in  his 
age.     The  two  aspects  of  that  idea  were  ration- 
alism and  science,  for  which  the  early  years  of 
the  century  had  prepared  the  way  and  which  the 
latter  years  were  to  see  fully  developed.     From 
the  many  workers  who  laid  the  foundation  of  sci- 
ence three  names  may  be  selected  as  variously 
typical:  Bacon  its  prophet,  Descartes  its  theo- 
riser,    and  Aldrovandus  its  practical  exemplar. 
All  three  were  conscious  of  the  radical  break  with 
the  past  involved  in  the  new  idea.     "The  only 
clue  and  method,"  wrote  the  Englishman  in  the 
Preface  to  his  Great  Instauration,  "is  to  begin  all 
anew,  and  direct  our  steps  in  a  certain  order, 
from  the  very  first  perceptions  of  the  senses"; 
and  at  the  end  of  the  path  he  descried  as  in  a 
prophetic  vision  the  race  of  discoveries,  sprung 
from  the  nuptial  couch  of  the  mind  and  the 
universe,  which  should  fulfil  the  wants  and  van- 
quish the  miseries  of  mankind.     How  deliber- 
ately Descartes  swept,  or  tried  to  sweep,  his 
brain  free  of  the  cobwebs  of  tradition,   need 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  l6l 

not  be  told;  he  too  had  his  vision,  not  so  much 
of  the  future,  as  of  the  present  universe  revolv- 
ing like  some  monstrous  engine,  wheel  within 
wheel,  all  whose  intricate  motions  could  be 
explained  by  purely  mechanical  laws.  And 
already  Aldrovandus,  in  his  garden  at  Padua, 
had  seen,  imperfectly  no  doubt,  the  necessity 
of  rewriting  the  whole  book  of  natural  history 
from  actual  observation.  The  fruition  of  the 
movement,  so  far  as  England  is  concerned,  began 
in  the  year  1662,  when  Charles  II.,  himself  a 
curious  observer  of  physical  experiments,  chart- 
ered the  Royal  Society.  In  a  few  years  Newton 
and  Locke,  the  acknowledged  fathers  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  were  to  complete  the  theory 
of  natural  law  and  extend  its  sway  over  man- 
kind, the  one  by  his  investigations  of  universal 
motion,  the  other  by  his  analysis  of  the  human 
understanding. 

Now  the  significance  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne 
lies  in  the  fact  that  he  was  at  once  by  intellect  a 
force  in  the  forward  movement  and  by  tempera- 
ment a  reactionary.  How  clearly  he  has  caught 
the  new  method  of  study  and  how  lovingly  he 
nevertheless  dallies  with  the  witchery  of  the 
old  learning,  may  be  seen  by  any  one  who  is 
willing  to  read  through  his  formidable  treatise 
of  Vulgar  Errors.  His  professed  purpose  is  to 
take  the  magical  and  fantastic  legends  about 
natural  objects  one   by  one,   and   show  their 


l62  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

incompatibility  with  reason  and  observation; 
yet  it  is  evident  withal  that  his  heart  is  not 
entirely  in  his  thesis.  No  doubt  he  often 
employs  the  obvious  means  of  discrediting  a 
myth  by  direct  experiment.  Thus  it  is  com- 
monly believed  "that  a  kingfisher  hanged  by 
the  bill  sheweth  in  what  quarter  the  wind  is  by 
an  occult  and  secret  propriety."  Browne  is  not 
content  with  declaring  it  repugnant  to  reason 
"that  a  carcase  or  body  disanimated  should  be 
so  affected  with  every  wind  as  to  carry  a  con- 
formable respect  and  constant  habitude  there- 
to" ;  he  will  in  an  open  chamber  suspend  a  dead 
kingfisher  with  untwisted  silk  and  thereby 
satisfy  himself  of  the  fabulosity,  as  he  would 
call  it,  of  the  story.  That  is  good  science. 
But  at  other  times  he  is  satisfied  to  meet  the 
traditional  unreason  of  signatures  and  final 
causes  with  arguments  from  abstract  prob- 
ability and  inherent  propriety  which  are  really 
a  part  of  the  mythology  he  would  explode; 
and  this  when  a  simple  experiment  or  obser- 
vation lies  close  to  his  hand. 

But  this  ambiguity  of  method  strikes  deeper 
than  a  mere  uncertainty  in  rectifying  individ- 
ual errors.  In  his  introductory  chapters  Browne 
undertakes  a  general  purgation  of  the  faculties, 
which  suggests  somewhat  vaguely  Bacon's 
analysis  of  the  fourfold  fallacy  besetting  the 
understandings  of  men.     "The  first  and  father- 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  1 63 

cause  of  common  error  is  the  common  infirmity 
of  hvmian  nature,"  begins  the  Pseudodoxia, 
with,  possibly,  a  direct  reminiscence  of  the 
Baconian  idols  that  are  "inherent  in  human 
nature  and  the  very  tribe  or  race  of  man."  For 
the  idols  of  the  den,  or  those  incalculable  dis- 
positions of  the  individual  which  cause  the 
spirit  of  man  to  be  "variable,  confused,  and  as 
it  were  actuated  by  chance,"  Browne  gives  a 
scornful  chapter  on  the  "erroneous  inclination 
of  the  people,"  who  being,  in  the  eyes  of  this 
fastidious  royalist,  "a  farriginous  concurrence 
of  all  conditions,  tempers,  sexes,  and  ages,  it 
is  but  natural  if  their  determinations  be  mon- 
strous and  many  ways  inconsistent  with  truth." 
In  place  of  the  idols  of  the  theatre  and  of  the 
market  there  follows  a  somewhat  confused 
survey  of  the  misapprehensions  and  false  de- 
ductions, together  with  the  misleading  ad- 
herence to  authority,  which  it  is  the  more 
specific  purpose  of  the  treatise  to  expose;  for 
here,  in  the  blind  submission  to  the  past,  as 
he  says,  lurks  "the  mortallest  enemy  unto 
knowledge  and  that  which  hath  done  the  great- 
est execution  upon  truth."  His  whole  treatise 
is  thus  professedly  an  essay,  such  as  Bacon  or 
Descartes  would  have  approved,  to  shake  off 
the  accumulated  burden  of  antiquity,  yet  it 
becomes  clear  as  he  proceeds  that  his  interest 
is  quite  as  much  in  massing  this  legendary  lore 


164  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

as  in  exhibiting  its  errors.  His  scholarship  is 
half  of  a  kind  with  that  of  Burton's  Anatomy 
of  Melancholy  and  Cudworth's  Intellectual 
System,  taking  the  form  of  a  huge  common- 
place book  wherein  the  quantity  of  the  citations 
is  the  first  concern  of  the  scholar  and  their 
relation  to  his  argument  only  the  second.  His 
hankering  goes  out  after  the  mistress  he  discards. 
A  composite  of  Bacon  and  Burton  in  equal 
parts  would  make  a  good  formula  for  the  author 
of  the  Pseudodoxia. 

Nor  does  this  ambiguity  end  with  Browne's 
halting  between  the  claims  of  the  past  and  the 
present.  It  was  not  merely  the  shackles  of 
tradition  in  matters  external  which  the  new 
scholarship  would  throw  away;  it  would  invade 
the  ancient  sanctuaries  of  the  heart  also,  and 
for  the  humility  of  religious  faith  substitute 
its  own  pride  of  investigation.  The  end  of 
that  movement  was  not  unapparent  even  to 
the  men  involved  in  its  triumphant  progress. 
Not  a  few  of  them  foresaw  and  dreaded  what 
seemed  to  them  a  limiting  of  man's  higher 
life  under  the  rationalising  tendency  of  sci- 
ence and  deism;  and  the  middle  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  in  the  years  before  the 
dominion  of  Newton  and  Locke,  shows  a  num- 
ber of  writers  who  revolted  against  the  threat- 
ened tyranny,  either  by  denying  its  dictates 
or  by  accepting  them  and  twisting  them  to 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  1 65 

other  conclusions.  Pascal  sought  to  avert 
the  danger  by  a  revival  of  Augustinian  doctrine 
tempered  with  the  intuitions  of  the  imagination. 
Henry  More  undertook  to  involve  the  ancient 
sombre  faith  together  with  the  coming  opti- 
mistic deism  within  a  cloud  of  Neo-Platonic 
mysticism.  Bunyan  belonged  to  the  extreme 
wing  of  Protestantism  which  disguised  its  par- 
ticipation in  the  new  philosophy  and  its 
lessening  spirituality  by  a  rigid  discipline  of 
intellectual  and  moral  dogmatism.  Our  Nor- 
wich physician,  half  unconscious  no  doubt  of 
his  position  and  with  the  Briton's  usual  inca- 
pacity of  logic,  was  led  by  the  insubordinate 
faculties  of  the  poet  within  him  to  another 
door  of  escape.  Coming  back  to  England  from 
the  Continental  schools  where  the  militant  ideas 
were  already  far  advanced,  he  felt  a  troubled 
uneasiness  of  conscience,  and  in  his  Religio 
Medici  undertook  to  establish  himself  in  a  safe 
compromise.  As  the  title  of  the  book  implies, 
the  problem  presented  itself  to  him  immediately 
as  the  need  of  reconciling  orthodoxy  and  the 
materialism  of  the  new  medicine;  and  so  he 
begins : 

For  my  Religion,  though  there  be  several  Circum- 
stances that  might  persuade  the  World  I  have  none  at 
all,  as  the  general  scandal  of  my  Profession,  the  natu- 
ral course  of  my  Studies,  the  indiflferency  of  my  Be- 
haviour and  Discourse  in  matters  of  Religion,  neither 


l66  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

violently  Defending  one,  nor  with  that  common  ardour 
and  contention  Opposing  another;  yet,  in  despite 
hereof,  I  dare,  without  usurpation,  assume  the  hon- 
ourable Style  of  a  Christian. 

Such  is  his  thesis,  but  religion,  as  Pascal  and 
Bunyan  understood  it  and  as  his  orthodox 
enemies  were  not  slow  to  observe,  receives  scant 
attention  from  his  wandering  mind,  while  his 
boasted  tolerance  toward  the  creed  of  Catholic, 
Jew,  or  Pagan  is  next  of  kin  to  indifference. 
In  effect  his  work  takes  its  place,  a  splendid 
place,  among  the  innumerable  protests  of  the 
imagination  against  the  imperious  usurpations 
of  science.  The  freedom  of  fancy  which  had 
wantoned  in  every  arbitrary  and  impossible 
combination  of  natural  objects — 

Humano  capiti  cervicem  pictor  equinam — 

such  license  was  becoming  impossible  for  a 
trained  intellect,  as  Browne  himself  had  proved 
in  his  Vulgar  Errors.  If  the  spirit  were  to  main- 
tain its  liberty  against  the  encroachments  of  a 
fatalism  which  would  reduce  the  circle  of  a 
man's  life  to  a  mere  wheel  spinning  for  an  hour 
in  the  vast  unconscious  mechanism  of  the  world, 
it  must  be  by  the  assertion  of  another  principle 
distinct  from  and  unmoved  by  the  levers  of 
physical  energy.  Bacon,  and  more  definitely 
Descartes,  had  indeed  granted  this  immaterial 
law,  but — qucB  supra  nos  nihil  ad  nos;  they  were 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  167 

pleased  to  leave  it  in  the  sphere  of  the  lofty 
inane,  with  no  hold  upon  the  heart  and  actions 
of  men,  with  no  answer  to  the  cry  of  the  be- 
wildered conscience,  with  no  root  in  human 
experience — an  empty  figment  of  the  reason 
or  a  sop  to  quiet  the  barkings  of  the  Church. 
What  they  lacked  essentially,  and  what  Sir 
Thomas  Browne  supplied,  was  the  religious  imag- 
ination, as  later  it  was  to  be  defined  by  Cole- 
ridge— the  faculty,  that  is,  by  which  we  unite 
the  broken  and  dispersed  images  of  the  world 
into  an  harmonious  poetic  symbol.  There  is 
in  the  unrestrained  use  of  this  religious  imagi- 
nation, as  in  all  liberty,  a  danger  of  evaporation 
into  a  vague  and  insubstantial  mysticism,  and 
such  a  tendency  was  in  the  end  to  wreck  the 
magnificent  intellect  of  Coleridge;  but  as  a 
protest  against  a  greater  and  more  common 
peril  it  had  its  beautiful  advantages.  Certainly 
in  their  investigation  of  the  law  of  nature  the 
new  men  of  science  and  reason  in  Sir  Thomas 
Browne's  day  did  not  sufficiently  recognise 
that  these  solid-seeming  phenomena  are  but 
the  shadow,  too  often  distorted  and  misleading, 
of  the  greater  reality  which  resides  within  the 
observer  himself,  and  obeys  its  own  law.  In 
their  haste  they  lost  the  power  of  subjecting 
the  less  to  the  greater  reality,  of  associating 
the  outer  with  the  inner,  and  thus  of  finding 
through  the  many  that  return  to  the  one,  which 


1 68  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

was  the  esemplastic  function  of  the  imagination.  ^ 
They  followed  too  well  the  precept  of  Bacon: 
"The  understanding  must  not  therefore  be 
supplied  with  wings,  but  rather  hung  with 
weights,  to  keep  it  from  leaping  and  flying." 
It  is,  I  know,  a  part  of  our  present-day  eager- 
ness for  obliterating  distinctions  to  deny  any 
incompatibility  between  science  and  religion, 
as  between  science  and  poetry.  And  in  a  way 
no  doubt  science  has  its  own  worship  and  its 
own  imaginative  domain.  Who  can  be  insen- 
sible to  the  exaltation  that  must  come  from 
tracking  nature  into  her  secret  reserves?  who 
has  not  felt  that  exaltation  when  the  mind  opens 

I  Biographia  Literaria,  chaps  x.  and  xiii. :  '"Esem- 
plastic. The  word  is  not  in  Johnson,  nor  have  I  met 
with  it  elsewhere.'  Neither  have  I.  I  constructed  it 
myself  from  the  Greek  words,  eiZ  iv  icXazTEiv,  to 
shape  into  one." — "The  imagination  then,  I  con- 
sider either  as  primary,  or  secondary.  The  primary 
IMAGINATION  I  hold  to  be  the  Hving  Power  and  prime 
Agent  of  all  human  Perception,  and  as  a  repetition  in 
the  finite  mind  of  the  eternal  act  of  creation  in  the 
infinite  I  am.  The  secondary  Imagination  I  consider 
as  an  echo  of  the  former,  co-existing  with  the  conscious 
will,  yet  still  as  identical  with  the  primary  in  the  hind 
of  its  agency,  and  differing  only  in  degree,  and  in  the 
mode  of  its  operation.  It  dissolves,  diffuses,  dissipates, 
in  order  to  recreate;  or  where  this  process  is  rendered 
impossible,  yet  still  at  all  events  it  struggles  to  ideaHse 
and  to  unify.  It  is  essentially  vital,  even  as  all  objects 
{lis  objects)  are  essentially  fixed  and  dead." 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  169 

to  the  thought  of  illimitable  dynamic  law?  And 
always  there  is  the  residuum  of  mystery  at  the 
end  of  our  actual  vision,  intensified  it  may  be 
by  the  slow-groping  security  of  our  approach. 
There  is  the  imagination  of  science  as  of  religion. 
Some  minds  may  dwell  in  one  and  the  other  of 
these  alternately,  or  even  confuse  them  together; 
but  in  their  essence  they  are  distinct.  If  we  were 
to  define  these  two  ge7iera  scholastically,  we 
should  say  that  the  scientific  imagination  is 
quantitative,  the  religious  qualitative.  Thus 
Lucretius,  impressed  by  the  almost  infinite  di- 
visibility of  matter  and  the  impossibility  of  con- 
ceiving any  ordered  relation  among  so  many 
parts,  sees  in  vision  the  innumerable  atoms 
hurtling  blindly  toward  some  centre  of  space, 
all  obeying,  so  far  as  the  shock  of  other  atoms 
permits,  some  incalculable  whim  of  diverse 
motion,  and  after  countless  changes  of  com- 
bination cohering  for  a  moment  in  the  forms  of 
this  world.  Such  a  vision  is  the  carrying  to  a 
quantitative  extreme  of  the  chance  and  individ- 
ualism that,  to  a  first  glance  at  least,  seem  to 
control  the  momentary  meetings  and  separations 
of  men  and  things.  It  is,  without  the  introduc- 
tion of  any  new  quality,  the  utmost  visible 
extension  of  our  feeling  of  that  which  Caesar 
called  "Fortune  whose  whim  governs  mankind." 
Of  the  same  kind  quantitatively  is  the  develop- 
ment of  the  sense  of  order  in  things,  as  seen  in 


170  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

another  mood,  to  a  universal  scheme  of  nature, 
typified  so  graphically  by  the  legend  of  Newton's 
deducing  the  law  of  gravitation  from  the  fall 
of  an  apple.  There  must  be  a  powerful  excite- 
ment of  the  imagination,  an  almost  overwhelm- 
ing magnitude  of  vision,  in  this  exercise  of  the 
scientific  faculty;  we  know  how  profoundly 
Newton  himself  was  stirred  by  the  grandeur  of 
his  discovery.  There  is  in  it  also,  we  must 
admit,  something  disquieting  to  most  minds 
when  they  enter  into  themselves  to  reflect  on 
this  dominance  of  nature,  whether  it  be  in  the 
direction  of  ungovemed  chance  or  of  inevitable 
regularity.  The  melancholy,  if  not  the  madness, 
of  Lucretius  is  well  known: 

O  miseras  hominum  mentes,  O  pectora  caeca! 
Qualibus  in  tenebris  vitae  quantisque  periclis 
Degitur  hoc  aevi  quodcumquest ! 

(O  wretched  minds  of  men,  O  blind  hearts!  in  what 
shadows  of  Ufe,  in  how  great  perils,  is  passed  this  little 
term  of  being!) 

Nor  is  there  less  significance  in  the  anxious  awe 
of  Herbert  Spencer  at  the  contemplation  of  those 
unsoundable  gulfs  of  space  through  which  his  law 
of  irresponsible  evolution  extended  its  sway.  ^ 
These  are  the  nostalgias  of  impersonal  science. 
Now,  what  I  have  called  the  qualitative  im- 

»  It  was  both  the  man  of  science  and  the  man  of 
religion  in  Pascal  that  expressed  the  same  dread. 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  I  71 

agination,  religious  or  poetic,  may  show  itself 
in  the  same  mind  with  the  quantitative,  but 
it  always  implies  the  addition  of  a  new  ele- 
ment. Thus  in  Lucretius  side  by  side  with  his 
vision  of  endless  ruthless  motion  is  the  con- 
ception, or  at  least  the  passionate  desire,  of  a 
calm  which  may  remove  him  entirely  outside 
of  the  world's  despotic  chance.  When,  in  the 
exordium  to  his  second  book,  he  breaks  into 
that  magnificent  praise  of  the  sapientum  templa 
Serena,  the  lofty  and  serene  places  whence  the 
wise  may  look  down  dispassionately  on  the 
wanderings  of  men  and  their  restless  seekings 
and  cruel  ambitions,  it  is  no  mere  separation 
from  toiling  mankind  for  which  he  prays,  but  a 
retreat  of  religion  within  his  breast  where  he 
may  take  refuge  from  the  terror  of  these  wild 
aberrations  carried  into  the  very  being  and 
mechanism  of  the  universe.  It  was  thus,  in 
the  superb  expression  of  this  longing  for  a  faith 
which  his  reason  would  not  admit,  that  he  may 
be  said  to  have  denied  divinely  the  divine. 
Newton  also  turned  from  his  contemplation 
of  inexorable  natural  law  to  the  most  orthodox 
and  childlike  confidence  in  Providence  and  the 
medley  of  Hebraic  prophecy.  We  are  apt  to 
forget  that  besides  his  Principia  he  wrote  an 
exposition  of  Daniel  and  the  Apocalypse.  Lu- 
cretius, intellectually  a  man  of  science,  emotion- 
ally a  poet,  seeks  relief  in  pure  negation,  and 


172  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

balances  annihilation  against  the  world.  New- 
ton apparently  never  tried  to  connect  the  spheres 
of  science  and  of  religion  or  saw  any  difficulty 
in  embracing  both  at  once;  his  dualism  of 
nature  and  deity  was  of  that  mechanical  sort 
which  is  possible  only  when  a  man  has  not 
stopped  to  realise  his  ideas  in  actual  human 
experience. 

Sir  Thomas  Browne,  it  is  needless  to  say,  stands 
far  below  Lucretius  in  emotional  vigour  and  as 
a  man  of  science  is  not  to  be  named  with  New- 
ton; but  in  his  method  of  escape  from  an  over- 
weaning  naturalism  he  has  a  place  of  his  own 
in  the  long  battle  of  the  spirit.  In  him  the 
witness  within  does  not  speak  in  the  Lucretian 
voice  of  magnificent  denial,  nor  is  it,  like  New- 
ton's, a  mere  echo  of  a  past  faith,  but  makes 
itself  heard  in  every  act  of  the  intelligence. 
Always  there  is  present  the  sense  of  something 
other  and  different  lurking  beneath  natural  law 
and  peering  out  at  the  observer  with  strange 
enticements;  and  this  to  him  was  the  great 
reality.  He  is  one  of  the  purest  examples  of 
the  religious  imagination  severed  from  religious 
dogma  or  philosophy;  dualism  with  him  takes 
the  form  of  an  omnipresent  and  undefined 
mystery  involving,  and  sometimes  dissolving, 
the  fabric  of  the  world.  There  is,  one  must 
repeat,  in  this  romantic  wonder,  setting  itself 
above  the  systematic  intellect  and  the  governing 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  I  73 

will,  an  insidious  danger,  which  in  later  times 
we  have  seen  degenerate  into  all  kinds  of  lawless 
and  sickly  vagaries.  Undoubtedly,  the  works 
of  Sir  Thomas  Browne  are  already  lacking  in 
solid  content,  and  verge  into  the  pure  emotion- 
alism of  music;  yet  they  are  saved  in  the  end 
by  the  writer's  sturdy  regularity  of  life  and  by 
the  great  tradition  which  hung  upon  the  age. 
Wonder  with  him  was  a  wholesome  elation  of 
spirit,  substituting  dreams,  it  may  be,  for  the 
laws  of  the  solid  earth,  but  still  a  tonic  and 
not  a  narcotic  to  the  law  of  character.  "Now 
for  my  life,"  he  exclaims  in  the  most  famous 
passage  of  his  Religio,  "  it  is  a  miracle  of  thirty 
years,  which  to  relate  were  not  a  history  but 
a  piece  of  poetry,  and  would  sound  to  com- 
mon ears  like  a  fable;  for  the  world,  I  count  it 
not  an  inn  but  an  hospital,  and  a  place  not  to  live 
but  to  die  in.  The  world  that  I  regard  is  my 
self;  it  is  the  microcosm  of  my  own  frame  that 
I  cast  my  eye  on ;  for  the  other,  I  use  it  but  like 
my  globe,  and  turn  it  round  sometimes  for 
my  recreation."  Here,  if  I  may  repeat,  is  no 
harsh  opposition  of  spirit  and  matter,  but  an 
attempt  to  interpret  and  estimate  the  law  of 
nature  by  the  law  of  a  man's  inner  life.  For 
this  protest  of  the  pure  imagination  against 
an  all-invading  rationalism  the  book  was  car- 
ried over  Europe,  accepted  the  more  readily 
because  the  window  of  escape  into  the  O  altitudo 


174  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

was  opened  by  one  who  had  standing  in  the 
schools  of  the  new  science. 

Browne  was  no  systematic  philosopher,  nor 
is  the  Religio  Medici  constructed  on  a  rigid 
argument — far  from  it.  Yet,  with  all  its  fan- 
tastic divagations  and  its  quaint  confessions, 
this  desire  to  restate  facts  in  accordance  with 
the  author's  "solitary  and  retired  imagination  " 
is  never  long  absent  and  gives  it  a  strong  unity 
of  effect.  "The  whole  creation  is  a  mystery," 
he  says;  "...  a  dream  or  mock-show,  and 
we  all  therein  but  pantaloons  and  antics"; 
rather:  "in  this  mass  of  Nature  there  is  a  set 
of  things  that  carry  in  their  front,  though 
not  in  capital  letters  yet  in  stenography  and 
short  characters,  something  of  divinity,  which  to 
wiser  reasons  serve  as  luminaries  in  the  abyss 
of  knowledge,  and  to  judicious  beliefs  as  scales 
and  roundles  to  mount  the  pinnacles  and  highest 
pieces  of  divinity.  .  .  .  This  visible  world  is 
but  a  picture  of  the  invisible,  wherein  as  in  a 
portrait  things  are  not  truly  but  in  equivo- 
cal shapes,  and  as  they  counterfeit  some  more 
real  substance  in  that  invisible  fabric."  Theol- 
ogy itself  is  saved  for  Sir  Thomas  by  its  appeal 
to  the  soaring  imagination: 

As  for  those  wingy  Mysteries  in  Divinity,  and  airy 
subtleties  in  Religion,  which  have  unhinged  the  brains 
of  better  heads,  they  never  stretched  the  Pia  Mater  of 
mine.     Methinks  there  be  not  impossibilities  enough 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  I  75 

in  Religion  for  an  active  faith;  the  deepest  Mysteries 
ours  contains  have  not  only  been  illustrated,  but 
maintained,  by  Syllogism  and  the  rule  of  Reason.  I 
love  to  lose  myself  in  a  mystery,  to  pursue  my  Reason 
to  an  O  altitudo!  .  .  .  Where  there  is  an  obscurity 
too  deep  for  our  Reason,  't  is  good  to  sit  down  with 
a  description,  periphrasis,  or  adumbration;  for  by 
acquainting  our  Reason  how  unable  it  is  to  display 
the  visible  and  obvious  effects  of  nature,  it  becomes 
more  humble  and  submissive  unto  the  subtleties  of 
Faith;  and  thus  I  teach  my  haggard  and  unreclaimed 
reason  to  stoop  unto  the  lure  of  Faith. 

It  was  inevitable  that  such  a  mind,  groping 
in  the  bowels  and  anatomies  of  nature  for  a 
justification  of  faith,  should  have  been  fasci- 
nated by  that  mystery  which,  while  extending 
the  claims  of  materialism  to  their  logical 
consummation,  startles  the  observer  by  its 
horrible  reductio  scientics  ad  absurdum.  The 
accidental  unearthing  of  some  old  mortuary 
vessels  was,  therefore,  only  the  accidental  cause 
that  set  our  author  off  in  wild  pursuit  of  the 
paradox  which  finds  in  the  absolute  negative 
of  death  the  affirmation  of  omnipotent  mystery. 
Through  all  the  pedantries  of  the  Urn-Burial, 
with  its  notes  on  funeral  customs  jumbled  to- 
gether from  every  conceivable  source,  it  is  the 
glimpse  of  these  mockeries  of  reason,  breaking 
through  the  stiff  language  ever  and  anon  with 
shrill  eloquence,  that  keeps  the  interest  of  the 
reader  alert.  What  is  human  pride  before  this 
imperious  scoffer?    "Now  since  these  dead  bones 


176  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

have  already  outlasted  the  living  ones  of  Me- 
thuselah, and  in  a  yard  underground,  and  thin 
walls  of  clay,  outworn  all  the  strong  and  specious 
buildings  above  it,  and  quietly  rested  under  the 
drums  and  tramplings  of  three  conquests;  what 
prince  can  promise  such  diutumity  unto  his 
reliques?" — "The  iniquity  of  oblivion  blindly 
scattereth  her  poppy,  and  deals  with  the  memory 
of  men  without  distinction  to  merit  of  perpetu- 
ity." — "And  therefore  restless  inquietude  for 
the  diutumity  of  our  memories  unto  present 
considerations  seems  a  vanity  almost  out  of 
date  and  superannuated  piece  of  folly." — "But 
man  is  a  noble  animal,  splendid  in  ashes  and 
pompous  in  the  grave,  solemnising  nativities 
and  deaths  with  equal  lustre,  nor  omitting 
ceremonies  of  bravery,  in  the  infamy  of  his 
nature."  Thus  paradox  swallows  paradox  until 
at  the  end  of  the  book,  as  all  readers  know, 
these  tongues  of  eloquence  leap  together  like 
the  flames  bursting  upward  from  a  funeral 
pyre,  and  the  grinning  contradiction  of  the 
tomb  is  lost  in  "the  metaphysics  of  true 
belief." 

Once  again,  in  his  Letter  to  a  Friend,  Browne 
takes  up  the  theme  of  death;  and  again,  as 
he  tells  of  watching  by  the  bed-side  of  the 
young  man  who  is  fading  away  visibly  into 
the  invisible  darkness,  it  is  the  strangeness 
of  the  miracle  that   absorbs  him.      He  could 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  1 77 

not  go  to  cure  the  body  of  a  patient,  he  says 
elsewhere,  without  losing  his  profession  in  con- 
cern for  the  man's  soul;  but  one  interest  of 
his  own  he  must  always  take  with  him — his 
inquisitive  research  into  the  paradox  of  living 
and  dying.  Thus  his  Letter  to  a  Friend,  with 
its  lingering  absorption  in  the  present  mystery 
creeping  upon  the  world  before  the  very  eyes 
of  the  watcher  like  an  all-obliterating  shadow 
out  of  the  infinite,  may  be  regarded  as  a  com- 
plement to  the  Urn-Burial,  with  its  rhapsody  on 
the  memorials  of  the  past.  Together  they 
would  seem  to  say:  Look  hither  and  lay  aside 
vain  pretensions;  there  is  no  science  of  death. 
Other  writers,  especially  in  more  recent  times, 
have  undertaken  to  express  this  constant  dual- 
ism of  knowledge  and  wonder,  of  reason  and 
mystery,  which  it  was  the  main  business  of 
eighteenth-century  philosophy  to  deny,  but 
none  with  the  same  magnificent  impetuosity  as 
Sir  Thomas  Browne.  Something  of  his  power 
was  due  to  the  age,  something  to  the  solidity 
of  his  training ;  but  still  more  to  the  imaginative 
burden  of  his  language.  Of  style  in  one  sense 
he  possesses  indeed  little;  unless  sustained  by 
poetic  emotion,  he  is  never  safe  from  floundering 
in  the  most  awkward  verbiage.  He  is,  more 
perhaps  than  any  other  author  in  English, 
dependent  for  his  fame  on  purple  patches.  But 
at  its  best  there  is  I  know  not  what  excellence 

13 


178  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  sound  in  his  language,  a  melody  through 
which  we  seem  to  catch  echoes  of  other-worldly 
music  that  lift  the  hearer  into  an  ecstasy  of 
admiration.  He  has,  as  he  himself  might 
say,  transfused  into  words  the  magic  of  that 
Pythagorean  numerosity  which  forever  haunted 
his  understanding: 

It  is  my  temper,  and  I  like  it  the  better,  to  affect 
all  harmony;  and  sure  there  is  music  even  in  the 
beauty,  and  the  silent  note  which  Cupid  strikes,  far 
sweeter  than  the  sound  of  an  instrument.  For  there 
is  a  music  where  ever  there  is  a  harmony,  order  or 
proportion;  and  thus  far  we  may  maintain  the  music 
of  the  Spheres:  for  those  well-ordered  motions,  and 
regular  paces,  though  they  give  no  sound  unto  the 
ear,  yet  to  the  understanding  they  strike  a  note  most 
full  of  harmony.  Whosoever  is  harmonically  com- 
posed, delights  in  harmony;  which  makes  me  much 
distrust  the  symmetry  of  those  heads  which  declaim 
against  all  Church-Music.  For  my  self,  not  only  from 
my  obedience,  but  my  particular  Genius,  I  do  embrace 
it :  for  even  that  vulgar  and  Tavern-Music,  which  makes 
one  man  merry,  another  mad,  strikes  in  me  a  deep 
fit  of  devotion,  and  a  profound  contemplation  of  the 
first  Composer.  There  is  something  in  it  of  Di- 
vinity more  than  the  ear  discovers :  it  is  an  Hieroglyph- 
ical  and  shadowed  lesson  of  the  whole  World,  and 
creatures  of  God;  such  a  melody  to  the  ear,  as  the 
whole  World  well  understood,  would  afford  the  under- 
standing. In  brief,  it  is  a  sensible  fit  of  that  harmony, 
which  intellectually  sounds  in  the  ears  of  God.  I  will 
not  say  with  Plato,  the  soul  is  an  harmony,  but  har- 
monical,  and  hath  its  nearest  sympathy  unto  Music: 
thus  some  whose  temper  of  body  agrees,  and  humours 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  I  79 

the  constitution  of  their  souls,  are  born  Poets, 
though  indeed  all  are  naturally  inclined  unto 
Rhythm. 

It  is  not  easy  to  discover  the  secret  of  these 
harmonies  in  the  words  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne 
himself,  for  his  manner  varies  from  page  to  page. 
At  times,  especially  in  his  earlier  works,  the  lan- 
guage is  brief  and  direct,  built  up  on  the  simplest 
Anglo-Saxon  roots.  More  often  it  has  a  touch 
of  exotic  strangeness,  due  principally  to  the  ex- 
cess of  Latin.  "He  has  many  verba  ardentia," 
said  Dr.  Johnson,  "forcible  expressions,  which  he 
would  never  have  found,  but  by  venturing  to 
the  utmost  verge  of  propriety ;  and  flights  which 
would  never  have  been  reached,  but  by  one  who 
had  very  little  fear  of  the  shame  of  falling." 
There  is  undoubtedly  a  risk  in  this  constant  re- 
course to  Latin  idioms  as  may  be  seen  in  many 
of  his  imitators.  Dr.  Johnson,  who  is  known 
to  have  modelled  his  style  on  Browne's,  was 
able  to  attain  by  this  means  a  gravity  that 
raises  the  commonplace  almost  to  the  sublime; 
but  other  writers  only  sank  with  its  weight. 
Whole  passages  in  The  Seasons,  for  instance, 
halt  and  stumble  as  if  loaded  with  foreign 
chains.  Browne  himself,  we  may  suppose, 
employed  this  exotic  style,  as  did  Milton  and 
others  of  that  age,  primarily  because  his  reading 
was  so  much  more  in  Latin  than  in  English  that 
these    outlandish   terms    came    to    him    more 


l8o  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

promptly  than  their  home  equivalents.  But  there 
is  also  at  times  an  artistic  consciousness  that  the 
note  of  surprise  was  better  obtained  by  unusual 
words,  and  the  desired  richness  of  harmony 
more  fully  developed.  I  do  not  know  whether 
the  musical  difference  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  and 
classical  elements  in  our  tongue  has  been  ana- 
lysed, but  to  me  they  seem  in  the  hands  of  a 
master  to  be  related  to  each  other  as  a  pure 
tone  is  to  one  rich  in  harmonics.  There  is, 
to  one  at  least  whose  mind  is  much  charged 
with  reading,  a  full  and  complex  effect  from 
the  sonorous  Latin  words  due  to  countless  half- 
remembered  associations,  comparable  to  the 
overtones  that  give  the  note  of  the  violin  its 
pathetic  appeal.  Almost  always  we  catch  these 
echoes  of  the  past  in  the  language  of  Sir  Thomas 
Browne  when  most  characteristic;  they  are 
heard  clearly  in  such  a  passage  as  this,  in  the 
Letter  to  a  Friend: 

And  altho'  he  had  no  Opinion  of  reputed  Felicities 
below,  and  apprehended  Men  widely  out  in  the  Estimate 
of  such  Happiness;  yet  his  sober  Contempt  of  the 
World  wrought  no  Democritism  or  Cynicism,  no  laugh- 
ing or  snarling  at  it,  as  well  understanding  there  are 
not  Felicities  in  this  World  to  satisfy  a  serious  Mind; 
and  therefore  to  soften  the  Stream  of  our  Lives,  we 
are  fain  to  take  in  the  reputed  Contentations  of  this 
World,  to  unite  with  the  Crowd  in  their  Beatitudes, 
and  to  make  ourselves  happy  by  Consortion,  Opinion, 
or  Co-existimation :  for  strictly  to  separate  from  re- 
ceived  and  customary  Felicities,  and  to  confine  unto 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  l8l 

the  Rigor  of  Realities,  were  to  contract  the  Consola- 
tion of  our  Beings  unto  too  uncomfortable  Circum- 
scriptions. 

That  may  sound  at  first  merely  quaint,  if 
not  cumbrous;  yet  to  the  attentive  ear  what 
subtle  harmonies  unfold  themselves.  To  under- 
stand the  force  of  this  deliberate  Latinisation, 
consider  for  a  moment  the  contrast  of  the  words 
felicity  and  happiness  that  stand  so  close  together. 
The  Saxon  word  is  direct,  strong,  simple,  with 
the  associations  of  the  common  homely  feelings 
of  the  day.  But  in  that  thrice-repeated  felicities 
there  is  I  know  not  what  magic  accumulation 
of  meaning  from  the  hopes  and  desires  and 
disappointments  of  many  peoples  through  many 
ages.  I  hear,  as  it  were  a  deep  undertone,  the 
grave  reflection  of  Virgil's  Felix  qui  potuit  rerum 
cognoscere  causas.  I  hear  the  pathetic  phrase 
of  Boethius,  thinking  of  his  own  fall  from 
felicity  and  of  the  waning  world :  Fuisse  felicem 
et  non  esse.  That  phrase,  I  recall,  was  caught 
up  by  Dante  and  placed  in  the  mouth  of  his 
Francesca  da  Rimini:  Che  ricordarsi  del  tempo 
felice — ' '  there  is  no  greater  woe  than  to  remember 
in  pain  the  time  of  felicity";  and  from  Dante 
it  has  passed  into  the  emotional  life  of  Eu- 
rope. Echoes  of  the  word  come  to  me  from 
great  passages  in  Spanish  and  French,  and 
last  of  all  the  plea  of  dying  Hamlet  to  his 
friend : 


I  82  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

If  thou  didst  ever  hold  me  in  thy  heart, 

Absent  thee  from  felicity  awhile, 

And  in  this  harsh  world  draw  thy  breath  in  pain. 

Can  any  one  fail  to  perceive  the  lingering  sweet- 
ness and  manifold  associations  of  the  word 
felicity  here  as  it  is  contrasted  with  the  quick, 
stinging  Saxon  words  that  follow?  Such  was 
the  music  of  the  emotions  sought  and  obtained 
by  Sir  Thomas  Browne  in  the  passage  quoted. 
To  vary  the  metaphor,  his  cunning  use  of  Latin 
words  affects  the  ear  like  the  hearing  of  some 
majestic  fugue,  in  which  the  melody,  taken  up 
by  voice  after  voice,  is  repeated  and  varied  and 
interwoven  until  the  listener  by  the  long  accumu- 
lation of  sound  is  rapt  out  of  the  solid  world 
into  mystic  admiration. 

And  of  the  man  Thomas  Browne  himself, 
the  dreamer  of  these  haunting  fugues,  what 
shall  be  said?  As  I  read  his  meditations  on 
life  and  death  it  seems  to  me  I  am  in  communi- 
cation with  one  of  the  few  happy  men  of  this 
world.  I  do  not  mean  that  there  was  any  cheap 
illusion  in  his  mind.  "Place  not  the  expec- 
tation of  great  happiness  here  below,"  he  writes 
toward  the  end  of  life,  "or  think  to  find  heaven 
on  earth;  wherein  we  must  be  content  with 
embryon-felicities  and  fruitions  of  doubtful 
faces."  But  more  almost  than  any  other 
Englishmen  he  was  able  to  transform  the  hard 
perception  of  facts  into  a  calm  and  continuous 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  1 83 

delight  of  wonder.  The  visions  of  the  night, 
in  which  he  seems  to  have  been  so  fortunate, 
were  but  the  freer  realisation  of  the  dream  that 
filled  his  waking  hours: 

Let  me  not  injure  the  felicity  of  others,  if  I  say  I  am 
as  happy  as  any:  Ruat  coelum.  Fiat  voluntas  tua,  salveth 
all;  so  that  whatsoever  happens,  it  is  but  what  our 
daily  prayers  desire.  In  brief,  I  am  content,  and 
what  should  providence  add  more?  Surely  this  is  it 
we  call  Happiness,  and  this  I  do  enjoy;  with  this  I  am 
happy  in  a  dream,  and  as  content  to  enjoy  a  happiness 
in  a  fancy,  as  others  in  a  more  apparent  truth  and 
reality.  .  .  .  And  surely  it  is  not  a  melancholy  conceit 
to  think  we  are  all  asleep  in  this  World,  and  that  the 
conceits  of  this  life  are  as  mere  dreams  to  those  of  the 
next,  as  the  Phantasms  of  the  night,  to  the  conceits 
of  the  day.  There  is  an  equal  delusion  in  both,  and 
the  one  doth  but  seem  to  be  the  emblem  or  picture 
of  the  other;  we  are  somewhat  more  than  our  selves 
in  our  sleeps,  and  the  slumber  of  the  body  seems  to  be 
but  the  waking  of  the  soul. 

That  is,  if  you  please,  the  very  tongue  and  utter- 
ance of  a  confirmed  disillusion;  yet  it  is,  in  men 
of  his  temperament,  out  of  this  brave  appropri- 
ation of  vanity,  and  out  of  this  alone,  that 
reflection  rises  into  its  own  station  of  content. 
Only  thus,  to  use  the  language  of  Dr.  Henry 
More,  was  he  able  to  sound  "the  sweetest  and 
most  enravishing  musical  touches  upon  the  mel- 
ancholised  passions." 

Nor  must  this  mood  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne 
be  regarded   as  a  sullen  withdrawal  from  the 


184'  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

world  of  common  activities;  there  was  nothing 
personal  in  his  melancholy,  and  his  disillusion 
was  consistent  with  a  noble  conquest  of  fortune. 
By  profession  and  character  he  was  led  to  hold 
aloof  from  the  civil  tumult  that  stormed  over 
England  until  his  fifty-fifth  year.  Yet  there 
was  nothing  cowardly  in  his  inaction,  and 
indeed  it  was  by  the  waiting  sobriety  of  such  men 
as  he  that  his  country  was  finally  saved  and 
made  sound.  His  sympathies  were  openly 
with  the  royalist  cause,  and  at  least  once  he 
defied  Parliament  by  refusing  to  contribute  to 
the  fund  for  reducing  Newcastle.  Apart  from 
politics  he  must  have  been  one  of  the  busiest 
men  of  his  age,  combining  with  rare  completeness 
the  happiest  traits  of  the  amateur  and  the  pro- 
fessional. He  was  greatly  learned,  yet  carried 
his  erudition  as  a  plaything.  He  was  deeply 
religious,  yet  without  bigotry  or  intolerance;  a 
man  of  science  abreast  with  the  movement  of 
the  times,  yet  a  maker  of  magic  dreams;  a 
witness  of  tremendous  events,  yet  undisturbed 
in  his  private  pursuits;  a  wide  traveller,  yet 
satisfied  with  the  provincial  circle  of  Norwich; 
an  observer  of  nature  and  inveterate  collector 
of  curiosities,  yet  an  adept  in  immaterial  mysti- 
cism; a  man  of  countless  interests  and  engage- 
ments, yet  carrying  with  him  always  the  peace 
of  a  conscious  self-recollection.  Honours  came 
to  him  with  the  years,  and  from  first  to  last  he 


SIR  THOMAS  BROWNE  185 

practised  the  supreme  art  of  friendship.  Espe- 
cially, as  age  grew  upon  him,  he  renewed  his 
hold  upon  life  by  sympathy  with  the  young 
men  who  came  to  him  as  to  a  master  in  the 
new  learning  and  one  skilled  in  the  musical 
interpretation  of  doubt.  So  many  men  famous 
in  thought  and  action  seem  to  us,  as  we  search 
narrowly  into  their  hearts,  to  have  suffered 
some  inner  thwarting  and  discontent,  that  there 
is  always  a  charm  in  turning  back  to  the  confes- 
sions— and  all  his  works  are  successive  chapters 
of  self-revelation — of  one  who  found  inviolable 
happiness  in  the  wisdom  of  the  imagination. 
And  we  are  assured  that,  if  we  knew  him  even 
more  intimately,  we  should  not  find  these  springs 
of  content  lacking,  and  that,  if  we  had  preserved 
to  us  the  diary  which  apparently  he  kept  in 
order  to  "annihilate  not  the  mercies  of  God 
by  the  oblivion  of  ingratitude,"  we  should  the 
more  abundantly  admire  the  miracle  of  his 
daily  life.  That  precious  journal  is  lost,  but 
we  have  at  least  one  glimpse  into  his  habits, 
no  wise  miraculous,  indeed,  but  homely  and 
pleasant  to  remember,  from  another  diarist. 
On  the  17th  of  October,  167 1,  John  Evelyn 
made  this  record  of  a  visit  to  Norwich : 

Next  morning  I  went  to  see  Sir  Tho.  Browne  (with 
whom  I  had  some  time  corresponded  by  letter,  the' 
I  had  never  seen  him  before).  His  whole  house  and 
garden  being  a  paradise  and  cabinet  of  rarities,  and 


l86  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

that  of  the  best  collection,  especially  medals,  books, 
plants,  and  natural  things.  Amongst  other  curiosities 
Sir  Thomas  had  a  collection  of  the  eggs  of  all  the  fowl 
and  birds  he  could  procure,  that  country  (especially 
the  promontory  of  Norfolk)  being  frequented,  as  he 
said,  by  several  kinds  which  seldom  or  never  go  farther 
into  the  land,  as  cranes,  storks,  eagles,  and  variety  of 
water-fowl.  He  led  me  to  see  all  the  remarkable  places 
of  this  ancient  city,  being  one  of  the  largest,  and  cer- 
tainly, after  London,  one  of  the  noblest  of  England, 
for  its  venerable  cathedral,  number  of  stately  churches, 
cleanness  of  the  streets,  and  buildings  of  flint  so  ex- 
quisitely headed  and  squared  as  I  was  much  astonished 
at.  .  .  .  The  suburbs  are  large,  the  prospects  sweet, 
with  other  amenities,  not  omitting  the  flower  gardens, 
in  which  all  the  inhabitants  excel. 


BUNYAN 

There  is  no  province  of  our  literature  that 
seems  to  us  more  irrevocably  lost  than  that 
which  sprang  from  the  Puritan  theology  of  the 
seventeenth  century.  Who  to-day  goes  for 
consolation  to  The  Saint's  Everlasting  Rest  ?  or 
who  reads  the  voluminous  sermons  which 
were  the  comfort  of  the  saints  upon  earth? 
There  was  a  little  poetry  produced  that  still 
echoes  plaintively  to  the  ears  of  living  men — 
how  little  in  comparison  with  the  songs  of  the 
enemy!  Marvell,  indeed,  we  range  among  the 
Dissenters,    yet   his   most   magnificent   lines — 

But  at  my  back  I  always  hear 
Time's  winged  chariot  hurrying  near, 
And  yonder  all  before  us  lie 
Deserts  of  vast  eternity — 

occur  in  a  poem  of  frankly  pagan  sensuousness. 
He  wrote  an  Ode  upon  Cromwell's  Return  from 
Ireland,  but  he  can  only  praise  the  victor  as 
one  who 

Could  by   industrious  valour    climb 
To  ruin  the  great  work  of  Time, 

while  the  warmth  of  his  fancy  is  reserved  for  the 

187 


l88  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

royal  actor ' '  upon  that  memorable  scene.  "  And 
Milton,  who  might  seem  an  exception  to  the 
rule,  is  really  the  strongest  proof  of  its  validity; 
for  his  genius  sinks  just  in  proportion  as  he 
assumes  the  Puritan  theologian,  and  only  the 
splendour  of  his  native  powers  saved  him  in  the 
end  from  dreary  prosing.  If  his  Paradise  Lost 
were  altogether,  as  he  meant  it  to  be,  an  argu- 
ment to  justify  the  ways  of  God  to  man,  instead 
of  the  glowing  pastoral  it  is  at  heart,  what  place 
would  it  have  in  our  affections?  Bunyan,  too,  is 
a  great  name.  But  of  all  the  sixty  books  he  is 
said  to  have  written,  who  knows  so  much  as  the 
names  of  more  than  four  or  five,  and  who  reads 
more  than  one  ?  That  one  book  has  gone  the  cir- 
cuit of  the  world,  and  has  enjoyed  a  vogue  second 
only  to  the  Bible  itself,  speaking  to  the  con- 
science of  the  vulgar  and  satisfying  the  taste 
of  the  fastidious.  Nevertheless,  so  surely  has 
the  day  of  The  Pilgrim's  Progress  waned  that 
more  than  half  a  century  ago  Poe  dared  call  it 
"a  ludicrously  over-rated  book,  owing  its  seem- 
ing popularity  to  one  or  two  of  those  accidents 
in  critical  literature  which  by  the  critical  are 
sufficiently  well  understood."  Such  condem- 
nation is  overdrawn,  no  doubt;  but  it  is  still 
true  that  within  the  last  few  decades  the  book 
has  sunk  from  a  work  of  powerful  realism  to  a 
quaint  allegory  for  the  curious.  Fathers,  who 
remember  how  they  were  held  spell-bound  all  a 


BUNYAN  189 

Sunday  afternoon  by  the  adventures  of  Christian, 
are  chagrined  to  find  that  their  own  children 
listen  to  these  coldly,  or  will  not  listen  at  all. 

In  his  Grace  Abounding,  Bunyan  relates  that 
as  he  lay  in  bed  one  morning,  he  was  "most 
fiercely  assaulted  with  this  temptation,  to  sell 
and  part  with  Christ. "  In  his  mind  the  wicked 
suggestion  still  kept  running,  "Sell  him,  sell 
him,  sell  him,"  as  fast  as  a  man  could  speak; 
until  over-wearied  at  length  and  out  of  breath 
with  contending,  he  heard  this  cry  pass  through 
his  mind,  "Let  him  go,  if  he  will,"  and  he 
thought  also  that  he  felt  his  heart  freely  consent 
thereto.  Readers  of  his  confession  know  how 
the  terror  of  that  evil  moment  weighed  upon 
his  memory: 

What,  thought  I,  is  there  but  one  sin  that  is  un- 
pardonable? But  one  sin  that  layeth  the  Soul  without 
the  reach  of  Gods  Mercy  ?  And  must  I  be  guilty  of  that? 
Must  it  needs  be  that?  is  there  but  one  sin,  amongst 
so  many  millions  of  sins,  for  which  there  is  no  forgive- 
ness; and  must  I  commit  this? 

The  burden  of  that  sin  of  the  conscience  might 
roll  from  him,  as  it  did  in  time,  but  there  was  a 
denial  of  the  religious  imagination,  not  unlike  it 
in  character,  which  lies  against  almost  all  the 
writing  of  his  school,  and  which  has  marked  it 
surely  for  death.  The  continual  redemption 
of  the  past  is  in  the  hands  of  those  who  have 
imagination,  and  whose  interest  falls  naturally 


I  go  SHELBURNE   ESSAYS 

Upon  Individuals  and  ages  which  lived  by  the 
same  faculty.  It  is  a  rule  from  which  there  is 
barely,  if  at  all,  escape,  that  those  who  forget 
the  past  are  in  their  turn  forgotten.  Now  the 
lack  of  imagination  among  the  Puritans  showed 
itself  in  contempt  of  the  arts  and  in  many  other 
manifest  ways,  but  in  none  more  clearly  than 
in  their  violent  break  with  the  continuity  of 
tradition.  They  had  no  patient  eye  for  the 
lengthened  chain  of  that  Law,  of  which 
"there  can  be  no  less  acknowledged,"  as  Hooker 
wrote,  having  this  weakness  of  theirs  in  mind, 
"than  that  her  seat  is  the  bosom  of  God,  her 
voice  the  harmony  of  the  world,  all  things  in 
heaven  and  earth  do  her  homage,  the  very  least 
as  feeling  her  care,  and  the  greatest  as  not 
exempted  from  her  power."  This  law  they 
attempted  to  embrace  immediately  with  the 
practical  reason  instead  of  leaving  its  dim 
perspective  to  the  climbing  vision  of  faith;  and, 
doing  so,  they  at  once  lost  the  true  sense  of  the 
infinite  as  something  that  escapes  the  under- 
standing and  can  be  only  grasped,  if  ever  grasped, 
in  types  and  symbols,  and  they  failed  to  per- 
ceive that  the  vicegerent  of  this  law  in  human 
affairs  is  a  product  of  time,  working  through 
that  communion  of  spirit  from  generation  to 
generation,  whereby  the  past  slowly  ripens  into 
the  present.  Their  intransigeance  was  thus 
no  more  the  result  of  moral  conviction  than  of 


BUNYAN  191 

deafness  to  the  voice  which  is  "the  harmony 
of  the  world."  They  were  not  aware  that  their 
refusal  to  distinguish  between  what  Hooker 
calls  "the  rule  of  faith"  and  "the  law  of  out- 
ward order  and  polity,"  and  their  consequent 
disregard  for  established  custom  with  their 
proud  ambition  of  new-creating  a  church-polity 
in  accordance  with  the  explicit  decrees  of  God — 
they  were  not  aware  that  all  this  was  due  to 
a  dwarfed  spirituality,  unable  to  measure  the 
heights  and  depths  of  being.  Their  legalism 
was  not  due  to  a  vivid  perception  of  the  Law 
of  God,  but  to  the  contracting  illusion  of  the 
present.  "Dangerous  it  were,"  to  quote  Hooker 
once  more,  "for  the  feeble  brain  of  man  to  wade 
far  into  the  doings  of  the  Most  High ;  whom  al- 
though to  know  be  life,  and  joy  to  make  mention 
of  his  name;  yet  our  soundest  knowledge  is  to 
know  that  we  know  him  not  as  indeed  he  is, 
neither  can  know  him ;  and  our  safest  eloquence 
concerning  him  is  our  silence,  when  we  confess 
without  confession  that  his  glory  is  inexplicable, 
his  greatness  above  our  capacity  and  reach. " 

And  this  lack  of  imagination  not  only  led 
them  to  "ruin  the  great  work  of  Time,"  sunder- 
ing generation  from  generation,  but  was  the 
cause  of  endless  actual  discord.  "The  world 
of  imagination  is  infinite  and  eternal.  .  .  .  There 
exist  in  that  eternal  world  the  realities  of  every- 
thing which  we  see  reflected  in  this  vegetable 


192  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

glass  of  nature,"  said  Blake,  and  in  that  sphere 
man,  who  "exists  but  by  brotherhood,"  was 
to  "put  off  in  Self-annihilation  all  that  is  not 
God  alone,"  and  be  everlastingly  made  one  in 
the  "divine  humanity."  Some  such  higher  use 
of  the  visionary  faculty  we  must  hold  in  mind, 
if  we  would  understand  in  what  way  the  self- 
righteousness  of  the  Puritans,  which  raised 
itself  up  to  take  heaven  by  storm,  tended  to 
cancel  its  efficacy  in  clashing  egotisms  here  upon 
earth.  The  extreme  individualism  of  their  creed 
must  not  be  dissociated  from  their  incapacity 
for  that  mystical  self-annihilation  in  the  divine, 
and  the  multiplied  sects  of  seventeenth-century 
England  were  a  direct  consequence  of  the 
deadening  of  spirituality  in  legalism.  It  was 
not  without  reason  that  their  exhortations  were 
based  chiefly  on  the  Old  Testament.  "Why 
is  the  Bible  more  entertaining  and  instructive 
than  any  other  book?  "  again  asks  Blake.  "Is 
it  not  because  they  [the  Scriptures]  are  addressed 
to  the  Imagination,  which  is  Spiritual  Sensation, 
and  but  mediately  to  the  Understanding  or 
Reason?"  Now,  there  were  Platonists  then  in 
England,  half-Puritans,  who  lost  themselves  in 
a  mysticism  as  vague  as  it  was  irrational,  but 
they  do  not  represent  the  real  sectarianism. 
The  Dissenters  as  a  rule  interpreted  the  Bible, 
not  through  the  imagination  which  is  spiritual 
sensation,  but  through  the  understanding;  and 


BUNYAN  193 

they  were  drawn  accordingly  to  those  parts  of 
the  Old  Testament  which  offer  religion  in  the 
form  of  a  militant  prescript  for  the  domination 
of  the  present.  It  was  inevitable,  therefore, 
that,  when  their  enthusiasm  and  their  conviction 
of  sin  died  away,  they  should  be  found  to  have 
prepared  England  for  the  natural  religion  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  And  when  this  in 
turn  falls  into  disrepute  they  suffer  rejection 
with  the  priests  who  are  the  sponsors  of  atheistic 
rationalism : 

To  cast  off  Bacon,  Locke,  and  Newton  from  Albion's 
covering, 

To  take  off  his  garments  and  clothe  him  with  Imagi- 
nation. 

We  shall  miss  the  significance  of  Bunyan  if 
we  forget  that  he  belongs  to  the  line  of  Bacon, 
Locke,  and  Newton,  and  that  his  exasperation 
of  the  moral  sense  is  the  working  of  their  con- 
ception of  legalism  in  the  religious  sphere  as  con- 
trasted with  Hooker's  earlier  and  Blake's  later 
vision  of  law  through  the  imagination.  Here 
we  touch  his  limitation,  and  here,  too,  lies  his 
strength  which  will  make  him  always  a  fascinat- 
ing study  for  the  dilettante  and  the  literary 
historian  after  he  has  dropped  out  of  living 
memory.  The  four  works  recently  published 
by  the  Cambridge  University  Press  ^  contain  all 

» Life  and  Death  of  Mr.  Badman  and  The  Holy  War. 
13 


194  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  his  writing  that  the  most  curious  are  likely 
to  find  interesting;  they  vary  in  form,  but  their 
theme  is  substantially  the  same :  the  representa- 
tion of  the  whole  of  life  under  the  allegory  of 
the  virtues  and  vices.  The  first  of  these,  and 
the  most  interesting,  with  the  exception  of  The 
Pilgrim's  Progress,  is  the  Grace  Abounding  to  the 
Chief  of  Sinners,  the  story  of  his  own  conversion 
told  with  intense  earnestness.  "God  did  not  play 
in  tempting  of  me,"  he  says  in  the  Preface; 
"neither  did  I  play,  when  I  sunk  as  into  a  bot- 
tomless Pit,  when  the  Pangs  of  Hell  caught  hold 
upon  me ;  wherefore  I  may  not  play  in  relating  of 
them,  but  be  plain  and  simple,  and  lay  down  the 
thing  as  it  was."  Dates  and  ordinary  events  form 
no  part  of  this  remarkable  autobiography,  but 
enough  is  told  to  give  a  vivid  picture  of  the  man 
himself  who  wrestled  with  God  for  salvation. 
"For  my  descent  then,"  he  begins,  "it  was,  as 
is  well  known  by  many,  of  a  low  and  inconsider- 
able generation ;  my  father's  house  being  of  that 
rank  that  is  meanest,  and  most  despised  of  all 
the  families  in  the  land."  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
his  father  was  a  tinker,  or  "braseyer,"  as  he 
signs  himself,  of  Elstow,  near  Bedford,  and  his 

The  text  edited  by  John  Brown,  D.D.  Cambridge 
English  Classics.    New  York:  G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons. 

1905- 

Grace  Abounding  and  The  Pilgrim's  Progress.     The 
same.  1907. 


BUNYAN  195 

son  John  followed  the  same  trade  all  his  life 
and  with  good  success.  The  boy  was  put  to 
school,  where  he  learned  to  read  and  write. 
He  says  that,  to  his  shame,  he  soon  lost  the  little 
that  he  learned,  but  somehow  he  retained 
enough,  or  in  later  life  reacquired  enough, 
to  steep  his  mind  in  the  language  of  the 
Bible  and  of  Fox's  Book  of  Martyrs.  The 
burden  of  his  autobiography  is  the  inherent  and 
absolute  evil  of  human  nature — not  the  sense 
of  man's  feebleness  and  perversity  such  as  has 
always  been  the  theme  of  pagan  and  Christian 
moralists,  but  an  immediate  realisation  of  sin 
as  bearing  with  it  the  threat  of  eternal  and 
unalterable  punishment.  His  people  walked 
in  the  continual  fear  of  hell,  with  a  troubled 
uneasiness,  not  unlike  the  physical  suffering 
we  should  endure  if  the  crust  of  the  earth  were 
no  more  beneath  our  feet  than  a  thin  shell, 
trembling  upon  its  central  fires.  How  early  this 
consciousness  came  to  him  we  know  from  his 
own  confession. 

Also  I  should,  at  these  years,  be  greatly  afflicted  and 
troubled  with  the  thoughts  of  the  fearful  torments  of 
Hell-fire;  still  fearing  that  it  would  be  my  lot  to  be 
found,  at  last,  among  those  Devils,  and  hellish  Fiends, 
who  are  there  bound  down  with  the  chains  and  bonds 
of  darkness,  unto  the  judgment  of  the  great  Day. 

These  things,  I  say,  when  I  was  but  a  child,  about 
nine  or  ten  years  old,  did  so  distress  my  Soul,  that 
then,  in  the  midst  of  my  many  sports,  and  childish 


196  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

vanities,  amidst  my  vain  companions,  I  was  often 
much  cast  down  and  afflicted  in  my  mind  therewith; 
yet  could  I  not  let  go  my  sins:  Yea,  I  was  also  then  so 
overcome  with  despair  of  Life  and  Heaven  that  I 
should  often  wish,  either  that  there  had  been  no  Hell, 
or  that  I  had  been  a  Devil;  supposing  they  were  only 
tormentors,  that  if  it  must  needs  be,  that  I  indeed 
went  thither,  I  might  be  rather  a  tormentor,  than  be 
tormented  myself. 

"Alas,"  said  Baxter,  "it  is  not  a  few  dull 
words,  between  jest  and  earnest,  between  sleep 
and  awake,  that  will  rouse  a  dead-hearted  sinner.'  * 
It  needed  the  heavy  hand  of  eternity  laid  on 
the  quick  shuddering  soul  to  make  vital  this 
thought  of  the  world  as  consisting  of  two  infinite 
and  mutually  exclusive  spheres  of  good  and  evil, 
of  God  and  man,  between  which  there  was  no 
medium  of  communication  save  the  arbitrary 
down-reaching  arm  of  mercy.  No  one  has  a 
right  to  believe  such  things  without  going  mad, 
said  the  jocular  autocrat  of  Boston,  and  long 
before  him  Baxter  used  almost  the  same  words: 
"Did  we  verily  believe,  that  all  the  unregenerate 
and  unholy  shall  be  eternally  tormented,  how 
could  we  hold  our  tongues,  or  avoid  bursting 
into  tears,  when  we  look  them  in  the  face?" 
The  mind  of  man  swings  like  a  hanging  pendulum, 
and  Rousseau's  faith  in  the  essential  goodness 
of  human  nature,  with  its  implied  denial  of 
infinite  consequences  altogether,  was  the  inevi- 
table   and   equally    exaggerated   reaction  from 


BUNYAN  197 

which  we  are  only  now  beginning  to  recover. 
The  Puritan  and  the  Rousseauist  stand  at  the 
two  opposite  poles  of  rationalism. 

As  for  the  actual  misdeeds  of  Bunyan,  they 
seem  for  the  most  part  to  have  been  venial 
enough.  He  was  always  honest  and  chaste; 
his  worst  vice  was  a  blasphemous  tongue — and 
what  fountains  of  blasphemy  he  must  have 
commanded!  There  is  a  touch  of  what  must 
be  conscious  humour,  and  what  seems  to  be 
almost  regretful  pride,  in  his  confession  of 
superiority  in  this  wickedness : 

One  day,  as  I  was  standing  at  a  neighbour's  shop- 
window,  and  there  cursing  and  swearing,  and  playing 
the  mad-man,  after  my  wonted  manner,  there  sate 
within  the  woman  of  the  house,  and  heard  me;  who, 
though  she  also  was  a  very  loose  and  ungodly  wretch, 
yet  protested  that  I  swore  and  cursed  at  that  most 
fearful  rate,  that  she  was  made  to  tremble  to  hear  me; 
and  told  me  further.  That  I  was  the  ungodliest  fellow, 
for  swearing,  that  ever  she  heard  in  all  her  life;  and 
that  I,  by  thus  doing,  was  able  to  spoil  all  the  Youth  in 
the  whole  Town,  if  they  came  but  in  my  company. 

Apart  from  this  preparatory  training  for  future 
exhortation,  his  repentance  was  concerned  chiefly 
with  such  genial  indiscretions  as  going  to  the 
steeple-house  to  ring  the  bells,  from  which  he 
was  diverted  by  the  fear  lest  one  of  the  bells 
should  fall  and  crush  him,  and  joining  in  a 
"game  of  cat"  on  Sunday,  from  which  he  was 
driven  by   a  voice  darting  from   heaven  into 


198  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

his  soul.  All  these  things  are  related  with  the 
simplicity  and  vividness  of  a  profoundly  uncon- 
scious art,  as  are  the  incidents  and  strange 
oracles  and  chance  meetings  by  which  he  was 
made  sure  that  the  grace  of  God  was  upon  him. 
One  of  these  incidents  brings  up  a  picture  of 
the  old  times  so  serenely  beautiful  and  comfortable 
in  itself  that  the  retelling  of  it  must  always  be  a 

joy: 

Upon  a  day,  the  good  Providence  of  God  did  cast 
me  to  Bedford,  to  work  on  my  Calling;  and  in  one  of 
the  streets  of  that  Town,  I  came  where  there  were  three 
or  four  poor  women  sitting  at  a  door,  in  the  Sun,  talking 
about  the  things  of  God;  and  being  now  willing  to  hear 
them  discourse,  I  drew  near  to  hear  what  they  said, 
for  I  was  now  a  brisk  Talker  also  my  self,  in  the  matters 
of  Religion:  But  I  may  say,  I  heard,  but  I  under- 
stood not;  for  they  were  far  above,  out  of  my  reach: 
Their  talk  was  about  a  new  birth,  the  work  of  God  on 
their  hearts,  also  how  they  were  convinced  of  their 
miserable  state  by  nature;  they  talked  how  God 
had  visited  their  Souls  with  his  love  in  the  Lord  Jesus, 
and  with  what  words  and  promises  they  had  been 
refreshed,  comforted,  and  supported  against  the  temp- 
tations of  the  Devil.  .  .  .  And  me-thought  they  spake, 
as  if  joy  did  make  them  speak;  they  spake  with  such 
pleasantness  of  Scripture-language,  and  with  such 
appearance  of  Grace  in  all  they  said,  that  they  were  to 
me,  as  if  they  had  found  a  new  world,  as  if  they  were 
people  that  dwelt  alone,  and  were  not  to  be  reckoned 
amongst  their  Neighbours. 

Two   things   are   particularly   remarkable   in 


BUNYAN  199 

this  account  of  Bunyan's  religious  awakening: 
the  absence  of  any  single  all-determining  event 
and  his  familiarity  with  the  Bible.  I  would 
not  cast  any  doubt  upon  those  violent  conver- 
sions which  come  upon  the  soul  like  a  flood  of 
sudden  blinding  light,  dividing  the  life  of  a  man 
into  two  incommunicable  periods.  This  has 
been  the  common  experience  of  the  great  saints 
from  the  days  of  St.  Paul  to  the  present;  it 
was  well  enough  known  in  the  days  of  Bunyan 
as  the  story  of  George  Fox  confirms.  But  it  is 
true,  nevertheless,  that  religious  zeal  and  the 
dramatic  imagination  tend  naturally  to  exagger- 
ate these  sundering  illuminations,  and  that  many 
a  convert  whose  faith  has  been  to  him  but  a 
flickering  candlelight  has  spoken  as  if  the  light- 
ning of  heaven  had  pierced  through  his  darkness. 
Now  Bunyan's  faith  was  no  feeble  flame,  but 
neither  does  he  make  any  pretensions  to  sudden 
conversion.  His  way  to  peace  was  through  weary 
backslidings,  and  even  when  he  counted  him- 
self among  the  saved  the  path  for  him  was 
still  through  trials  and  valleys  of  gloom.  His 
pilgrimage  was  like  that  of  his  Christian  after 
the  pack  had  rolled  off,  and  this  we  count  one 
of  the  marks  of  utter  sincerity  in  his  narrative. 
And  not  less  noteworthy  was  his  complete 
immersion  in  the  Bible.  Other  men  of  that  age 
knew  the  Scripture  as  he  did,  and  quoted  it  on 
all  occasions,  but  there  is  something  peculiarly 


200  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

direct  and  intimate  in  Bunyan's  relation  to 
the  holy  words.  They  became  the  sap  of  his 
daily  speech,  and  the  perennial  fascination  of 
his  written  style  is  due  to  the  perfect  interfusion 
of  Biblical  language  and  the  quaint  idiom  of  the 
Bedfordshire  roads.  The  sacred  book  was  not 
to  him  a  printed  page  or  a  conscious  memory; 
it  was  nothing  less  than  the  living  audible  voice 
of  God,  appealing  to  his  soul  through  the  ears, 
and  calling  to  him  at  uncertain  intervals,  as 
if  he  wandered  stumbling  in  a  country  of  hidden 
oracles.  Sometimes  the  sound  came  to  him 
within  doors.  "Once,  as  I  was  walking  to  and 
fro  in  a  good  man's  shop,"  he  says,  "bemoaning 
of  myself  in  my  sad  and  doleful  state,  .  .  .  and 
being  now  ready  to  sink  with  fear,  suddenly 
there  was  as  if  there  had  rushed  in  at  the  window, 
the  noise  of  wind  upon  me,  but  very  pleasant, 
and  as  if  I  had  heard  a  voice  speaking,  *  Didst 
ever  refuse  to  be  justified  by  the  Blood  of  Christ  ? ' 
.  .  .  Then  fell  with  power  that  Word  of  God 
upon  me,  '  See  that  ye  refuse  not  him  that 
speaketh.'  Heb.  12.25.  This  made  a  strange 
seizure  upon  my  spirit,  it  brought  light  with  it 
and  commanded  a  silence  in  my  heart  of  all 
those  tumultuous  thoughts  that  before  did  use, 
like  masterless  hell-hounds,  to  roar  and  bellow, 
and  make  an  hideous  noise  within  me."  More 
often  the  oracle  spoke  to  him  in  the  fields  as  he 
went  about  his  business:    "Now,  about  a  week 


BUNYAN  20I 

or  fortnight  after  this,   I  was  much  followed 
by  this  Scripture;  '  Simon,  Simon,  behold,  Satan 
hath   desired    to   have  you,'    Luk.    22.31,    and 
sometimes  it  would  sound  so  loud  within  me, 
yea,  and,  as  it  were,  call  so  strongly  after  me, 
that  once,  above  all  the  rest,  I  turned  my  head 
over  my  shoulder,   thinking   verily  that  some 
man  had,  behind  me,  called  me;  being  at   a 
great  distance,  methought,  he  called  so  loud." 
What  strange  gusts  of  terror  and  rapture  must 
have  shaken  the  soul  of  this  tinker  of  pots  and 
pans,  as  he  walked  about  listening  always  for 
the  very  voice  of  God  to  strike  his  ears  from 
the  invisible  haunts  of  space!     Which  of  us  to- 
day dare  affirm  that  he  really  comprehends  that 
sublimity?     The  very   nakedness   of   Bunyan's 
inspiration  is  a  check  to  his  fame.     I  turn  from 
him  to  that  poor  Welsh  physician  who,  during 
these   same   years   of   national     upheaval   was 
following   the  "pleasant  paths   of   poetry  and 
philology"    in   his   native   valley   of   the   Usk. 
Vaughan,  like  the  Bedford  Baptist,  was  steeped 
in  the  language  of  Scripture,  and  to  most  of  his 
poems  he  has  affixed  a  text,  as  if  they  were 
designed   to   be   sermons   of   quietness   to   his 
troubled  people — "I  '11  leave  behind  me   such 
a  large   kind   light."     But   how   different  was 
the    speech    of    the    divine    oracle    to    him    as 
he,  too,  travelled  up  and  down  in  his  healing 
profession : 


202  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

My  God,  when  I  walk  in  those  groves 
And  leaves,  Thy  Spirit  still  doth  fan, 

I  see  in  each  shade  that  there  grows 
An  angel  talking  with  a  man. 

Under  a  juniper  some  house, 

Or  the  cool  myrtle's  canopy; 
Others  beneath  an  oak's  green  boughs, 

Or  at  some  bubbling  fountain's  eye. 

Nay,  Thou  Thyself,  my  God,  in  fire. 

Whirlwinds  and  clouds,  and  the  soft  voice, 

Speak 'st  there  so  much,  that  I  admire 
We  have  no  conference  in  these  days. 

Here  is  the  touch  of  imagination  from  which 
the  Puritan  conscience  revolted,  and,  so  re- 
volting, shut  itself  off  from  the  future  commun- 
ion of  the  wise.  One  thing  was  wanting  to 
those  strong  men  before  the  Lord,  one  thing 
which  Wordsworth  was  to  rediscover  when  the 
wave  of  rationalism  for  a  while  subsided : 

To  look  on  Nature  with  a  humble  heart. 
Self-questioned  where  it  did  not  understand, 
And  with  a  superstitious  eye  of  love. 

They  knew   too   surely,   and   they   closed   the 
superstitious  eye  of  love. 

At  this  point  the  mind  turns  from  the  ex- 
treme Protestantism  of  England  to  the  Jansenist 
reformation,  which  during  these  same  years 
was  disturbing  the  current  of  religion  in  France. 
In  dogma  the  two  were  almost  identical;  both 
were  attempts  to  revive  the  sterner  creed  of 


BUNYAN  203 

St.  Augustine.  In  their  uncompromising  mor- 
ality, too,  the  followers  of  Jansen  showed 
themselves  closely  akin  to  the  Calvinists,  as 
their  Jesuit  enemies  were  not  slow  to  point  out. 
But  we  catch,  nevertheless,  a  world-wide  dif- 
ference as  we  pass  from  one  school  to  the  other ; 
we  feel  that  Bunyan  is  a  product  of  transition 
and  will  have  always  less  meaning  for  men  as 
time  ages,  whereas  Pascal  is  likely  to  be  remem- 
bered more  and  more  as  one  of  the  pure  voices 
of  faith.  What  is  the  cause  of  this  distinction  ?  Is 
it  not,  again,  due  just  to  the  presence  or  absence 
of  what  may  be  called  the  religious  imagination? 
For  Pascal  the  community  of  generation  with 
generation  by  tradition  makes  easy  the  concep- 
tion of  mankind  as  spiritually  one  instead  of  an 
innumerable  company  of  repellent  personalities ; 
for  him,  too,  the  sacramentarian  offices  of  the 
Church  introduce  a  certain  irrational  and  saving 
element  into  dogma.  The  door  is  left  open  for 
the  healing  ministry  of  ignorance  (the  knowing 
that  we  cannot  know)  and  for  the  superstitious 
eye  of  love.  In  this  twilight  of  humility  moves 
the  imagination,  leading  the  soul  upward  on 
ways  beyond  the  calculation  of  the  reason. 
Morality  is  not  weakened,  but  becomes  a  disci- 
pline and  not  an  end;  it  is  taught  to  be  the  hand- 
maid instead  of  the  mistress  of  the  spirit.  We 
can  feel  the  effect  of  this  difference  everywhere 
in  the  writings  of  the  two  men.      We  compare 


204  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Bunyan's  terror  at  the  voice  of  God  rebuking 
him  for  childish  sabbath-breaking  with  the 
vaster  awe  of  Pascal  at  the  eternal  silence  of 
infinite  space.  We  compare  also  the  Puritan's 
rigid  allegory  of  virtue  and  vice  with  the  vision 
of  the  Catholic:  "Infinitely  removed  from 
comprehending  the  extremes,  the  end  of  things 
and  their  source  are  for  him  insuperably  hidden 
in  an  impenetrable  secret;  he  is  equally  in- 
capable of  seeing  the  nothing  from  which  he 
is  drawn,  and  the  infinite  in  which  he  is  swallowed 
up."  And  we  perceive  how  the  hard  antinomy 
of  two  hostile  personalities,  God  and  man,  from 
which  both  Christians  take  their  start,  is  always 
trembling  in  Pascal  on  the  verge  of  that  great 
change  into  the  mystical  vision  of  two  immeas- 
urable potentialities  within  the  soul  itself.  It 
is,  in  a  word,  that  Protestantism,  despite  its 
conviction  of  sin,  was  a  forerunner  of  the  ration- 
al mood  which  is  fundamentally  a  denial  of 
religion,  whereas  Pascal's  was  the  voice  of  pure 
spirituality,  speaking  in  the  language  of  his  day. 
In  due  time  Bunyan  progressed  so  far  in 
faith  as  to  become  a  preacher  and  man  of  author- 
ity among  his  own  people,  and  even  in  London. 
The  power  and  sincerity  of  his  writing  would 
alone  lead  us  to  infer  his  eloquence  as  a  speaker, 
but  there  is  evidence  of  a  more  positive  sort. 
One  day,  when  he  had  exhorted  "with  peculiar 
warmth  and  enlargement,"  a  friend  congratu- 


BUNYAN  205 

lated  him  on  preaching  "a  sweet  sermon." 
"Ay"  said  he,  "you  have  no  need  to  tell  me 
that;  for  the  Devil  whispered  it  to  me  before 
I  was  well  out  of  the  pulpit."  Again,  Charles  II. 
is  said  to  have  asked  Dr.  Owen,  who  greatly 
admired  Bunyan,  "  how  a  learned  man  such  as 
he  could  sit  and  listen  to  an  illiterate  tinker." 
"May  it  please  your  Majesty,"  he  replied,  "I 
would  gladly  give  up  all  my  learning  for  that 
tinker's  power  of  preaching."  But  before 
attaining  this  wider  influence  Bunyan  had 
learned  the  lessons  of  solitude.  He  was  natu- 
rally as  a  youth  on  the  side  of  the  Parliament 
in  the  struggle  with  Charles  I.,  and  for  several 
years  bore  arms  as  a  private  soldier  under  Sir 
Samuel  Luke,  who  is  supposed  to  be  the  original 
of  Butler's  "Hudibras."  But  whether  he  be- 
came dissatisfied  with  the  later  Commonwealth, 
or  whether  his  native  sense  of  moderation  in 
practical  affairs  came  uppermost  in  time,  there 
is  reason  to  believe  that  he  was  among  those 
who  welcomed  Charles  II.  back  to  England. 

The  event,  however,  proved  disastrous  to 
him.  Within  six  months  after  the  King's  land- 
ing the  laws  against  Nonconformity  were  revived 
and  Bunyan  was  thrown  into  Bedford  jail.  He 
had  been  forewarned  of  the  arrest,  indeed  the 
justice  who  committed  him  seems  to  have  been 
ready  to  make  his  evasion  easy,  but  he  would 
not  promise  to  forego  preaching,  lest  his  cowar- 


2o6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

dice  should  "make  an  ill  savour  in  the  country" 
and  dishearten  the  timid.  For  twelve  years, 
with  one  intermission,  he  was  nominally  a 
prisoner,  part  of  the  time  being  closely  confined, 
and  part  of  the  time  going  free  on  parole. 
Granted  the  righteousness  of  the  law,  his  treat- 
ment was  by  no  means  severe;  at  least  his 
suffering  was  the  world's  gain,  for  in  the  forced 
meditation  of  those  days  he  found  himself  and 
measured  the  strength  of  his  genius.  It  was 
while  suffering  this  restraint  he  wrote  and 
published  (1666)  his  Grace  Abounding,  and 
composed  the  first  part  of  The  Pilgrim's  Progress. 
Between  his  release  and  his  death  just  before 
the  Revolution,  his  larger  influence  as  a  preacher 
was  exerted,  and  all  but  one  of  his  principal 
works  were  published — the  first  part  of  The 
Pilgrim's  Progress  in  1678,  the  Life  and  Death 
of  Mr.  Badman  in  1680,  The  Holy  War  in  1682, 
the  second  part  of  The  Pilgrim's  Progress  in 
1684. 

Every  one  knows  the  beginning  of  his  great 
allegory:  "As  I  walked  through  the  Wilderness 
of  this  World,  I  lighted  on  a  certain  Place  where 
was  a  Den:  and  I  laid  me  down  in  that  place 
to  sleep:  And  as  I  slept  I  dreamed  a  Dream." 
To  how  many  of  us  those  words  are  an  open- 
sesame  to  the  enchanted  caves  of  childhood. 
Hearing  them  we  remember  how  all  a  sabbath 
afternoon  we  would  hang  upon    a  dear  voice 


BUNYAN  207 

repeating  the  adventures  of  Christian  between 
the  City  of  Destruction  and  the  heavenly- 
Jerusalem,  and  how  in  a  child's  exquisite  antici- 
pation of  the  future  we  felt  ourselves  languish 
in  Doubting-Castle  and  knew  the  fatal  drowsi- 
ness of  the  Enchanted  Ground.  Naturally  we 
cherish  such  memories  and  hesitate  to  believe 
that  the  new  generation  will  never  pass  through 
that  experience;  we  grieve  to  see  one  of  the 
reservoirs  of  fruitful  emotion  dried  up.  But 
other  times,  other  books;  the  very  form  of  The 
Pilgrim's  Progress  is  against  its  vital  duration. 
Now  allegory  is  a  mere  matter  of  degree, 
and  all  good  literature  is  in  a  measure  of  this 
class.  It  was  so  at  the  beginning  as  the  stand- 
ing epithets  of  Homer  show:  Achilles  is  the 
personification  of  passionate  valour,  Odysseus 
of  cunning,  to  name  no  others.  So,  too,  we 
cannot  separate  Othello  from  the  idea  of  jealousy, 
Macbeth  from  that  of  ambition ;  and  these  char- 
acters are  none  the  less  real,  they  are  indeed 
more  essentially  human,  because  they  have  been 
moulded  by  the  abstracting  intelligence  into 
partial  types.  And  a  good  deal  of  Bunyan's 
work  lies  within  the  safe  bounds  of  this  artistic 
generalisation.  Now  and  then  the  very  oddness 
of  the  names  gives  a  touch  of  realism  to  some 
subordinate  character,  such  as  "Temporary, 
who  dwelt  in  Graceless,  two  miles  off  of  Honesty, 
next  door  to  one  Turnback."      And  there  is 


2o8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  famous  Mr.  By-ends  of  Fair-speech,  who 
was  related  to  "almost  the  whole  Town;  And 
in  particular  my  Lord  Turn-about,  my  Lord 
Time-server,  my  Lord  Fair-speech  (from  whose 
Ancestors  that  Town  first  took  its  name :)  Also 
Mr.  Smooth-man,  Mr.  Facing  both-ways,  Mr. 
Any-thing,  and  the  Parson  of  our  Parish,  Mr. 
Two-tongues,  was  my  Mother's  own  Brother  by 
Father's  side:  And  to  tell  you  the  truth,  I  am 
become  a  Gentleman  of  good  Quality,  yet  my 
Great  Grandfather  was  but  a  Waterman,  looking 
one  way,  and  rowing  another,  and  I  get  most 
of  my  Estate  by  the  same  occupation." 
There  is  much  good  talk  in  this  amiable  and 
frank  Mr.  By-ends.  And  if  some  of  these 
characters  are  still  flesh  and  blood  beneath 
their  allegorical  devices,  nearly  all  of  the  sym- 
bolical places  along  the  way  are  so  realistic  as 
to  have  passed  into  the  currency  of  the  com- 
mon language.  The  Slough  of  Despond,  the 
House  of  the  Interpreter,  the  upper  Chamber 
whose  window  opened  towards  the  Sunrising, 
Vanity  Fair,  the  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death, 
the  Castle  of  Giant  Despair,  the  Delectable 
Mountains — these  are  names  (not  all  of  them 
indeed  invented  by  Bunyan,  but  made  his  own 
by  the  right  of  genius)  that  every  man,  now 
and  hereafter,  must  pronounce  to  himself  when 
he  passes  through  the  realities  in  the  journey 
of  life.     We  shall  not  escape  them,  the  most 


BUNYAN  209 

prosaic  of  us — not  even  the  Dark  Valley  and 
the  Shining  Mountains.  It  is  no  small  praise 
thus  to  have  forestalled  the  experience  of 
mankind. 

So  far  Bunyan  preserves  the  balance  of  art 
between  the  reason  which  classifies  life  under 
abstract  categories  and  the  emotional  faculty 
which  reduces  life  to  individual  and  unrelated 
experience;  so  far,  in  a  word,  he  possesses  the 
literary  imagination  to  visualise  the  general  in 
the  particular.  But  when  we  consider  his 
writing  less  in  detail,  we  are  forced  to  admit 
that  it  inclines  as  a  whole  toward  the  unvis- 
ualised  abstract.  Now  allegory,  more  precisely 
speaking,  begins  just  when  the  golden  medium 
of  the  imagination  is  destroyed  by  this  over- 
balance of  rationalism,  and  to  such  an  extent 
all  four  of  Bunyan's  greater  works  fall  within 
this  justly  suspected  genre.  Even  the  Grace 
Abomtdmg,  notwithstanding  the  vividness  of 
some  of  its  imagery  and  the  intensity  of  its 
personal  emotion,  has  in  the  end  the  effect  of 
allegory;  for  the  individual  experience  is  over- 
shadowed by  the  conception  of  life  as  a  debate 
between  two  moral  abstractions,  man  the  per- 
sonification of  absolute  evil  and  God  the 
personification  of  absolute  righteousness.  The 
story  of  Mr.  Badman  has  a  number  of  minute 
scenes  of  which  any  novelist  might  be  proud, 
and  it  has  the  unexpected  excellence  of  showing 


2IO  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Bunyan's  native  common  sense  in  the  rearing 
of  children  and  in  other  practical  matters;  yet 
as  a  whole  it  also  resolves  itself  into  an  analy- 
sis of  absolute  evil,  here  without  the  counter- 
balance of  absolute  good.  In  The  Holy  War, 
the  least  human  of  his  books,  all  the  named 
virtues  and  vices  are  on  the  stage,  playing  their 
phantom  parts;  and  the  allegory  is  made  doubly 
unreal  by  the  fact  that  the  universal  scheme  of 
salvation  is  so  confused  with  the  act  of  redeem- 
ing an  individual  soul  as  to  keep  the  reader 
constantly  perplexed  to  know  which  is  meant. 
In  like  manner  it  must  be  admitted  by  one 
who  returns  to  The  Pilgrim's  Progress  after 
many  years  that  much  of  it  belongs  to  a  mode 
outworn.  These  Faithfuls  and  Helps,  these 
friends  named  Pride,  Arrogancy,  Self-Conceit, 
and  Worldly  Glory,  most  but  not  all  of  these 
hobgoblins  and  angels  that  Christian  meets 
by  the  way,  seem  rather  a  childish  substitute 
for  the  complexities  of  human  nature.  A  good 
deal  has  been  written  to  determine  the  sources 
from  which  Bunyan  drew  all  these  figures  and 
the  plan  of  his  book.  Resemblances  have  been 
pointed  out  to  The  Faerie  Queene  and  to  I  do 
not  know  how  many  other  books  in  English 
and  even  in  foreign  languages  which  the  Bedford 
tinker  could  never  have  read.  The  real  affinity 
of  his  work  lies  with  the  old  Morality  plays 
whose  spirit  persisted  in  many  disguised  forms 


BUNYAN  211 

long  after  the  drama  of  the  Renaissance  had 
usurped  the  stage.  In  those  scenes  where  the 
soul  of  mankind  is  beset  by  the  virtues  and 
vices,  with  the  mouth  of  hell  yawning  on  one 
side  and  heaven  resting  above,  Bunyan  would 
have  acknowledged  the  true,  but  hidden,  source 
of  his  inspiration.  How  like  they  were  to  his 
scheme  may  be  seen  from  the  list  of  characters 
appended  to  one  of  the  Moralities,  probably  of 
the  fifteenth  century:  "Nature,  Man,  Reson, 
.Sensualyte,  Innocencye,  Wordly  afifeceyon, 
Bodyly  lust,  Wreth,  Envy,  Slouth,  Glotony, 
Humylyte,  Charyte,"  etc.  It  is  a  minor  point 
that  Bunyan,  when  he  drops  into  rhyme,  shows 
an  uncouthness  not  unlike  that  of  the  ancient 
popular  cycles. 

The  whole  genre  has  something  naive  about 
it  and  one  might  suppose  it  would  retain  its 
undiminished  power  over  the  children  at  least 
of  every  generation.  That  it  does  not  may  be 
due  to  the  artificial  elements  mixed  up  with  the 
naive,  and  in  part  also  to  the  subtle  influences 
that  permeate  an  age,  extending  by  invisible 
signs  and  accents  from  the  old  to  the  young. 
Unconsciously  we  transfer  to  the  listening  child 
a  touch  of  our  own  indifference  to  this  drama 
of  the  moralities.  For  allegory  is  a  living 
thing  only  so  long  as  the  ideas  it  embodies  are 
real  forces  that  control  our  conduct.  Let  us 
believe  once  more  that  life  itself  is  a  pilgrim- 


212  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

age,  from  inherited  damnation  to  an  eternal  city 
beyond  the  river,  let  us  believe  that  angels  and 
devils  are  in  deadly  warfare  for  our  souls,  that 
our  daily  acts  are  sorted  into  virtues  and  vices 
of  infinite  consequence,  and  Bunyan's  dream 
will  again  take  hold  of  us  with  an  interest  that 
lies  outside  the  domain  and  claims  of  literature. 
Then  again  conscience  may  thrill  while  the 
imagination  sleeps.  But  until  that  time  I  fear 
we  shall  be  rather  in  the  position  of  the  pilgrim 
in  Hawthorne's  Celestial  Railroad: 

Not  a  great  while  ago  [so  that  pleasant  fable  begins], 
passing  through  the  gate  of  dreams,  I  visited  that 
region  of  the  earth  in  which  lies  the  famous  City  of 
Destruction.  It  interested  me  much  to  learn  that, 
by  the  public  spirit  of  some  of  the  inhabitants,  a  rail- 
road has  recently  been  established  between  this  pop- 
ulous and  flourishing  town  and  the  Celestial  City. 
Having  a  little  time  upon  my  hands,  I  resolved  to 
gratify  a  liberal  curiosity  by  making  a  trip  thither. 
Accordingly,  one  fine  morning,  after  paying  my  bill 
at  the  hotel,  and  directing  the  porter  to  stow  my 
luggage  behind  a  coach,  I  took  my  seat  in  the  vehicle 
and  set  out  for  the  stationhouse.  It  was  my  good 
fortune  to  enjoy  the  company  of  a  gentleman — one 
Mr.  Smooth-it-away — who,  though  he  had  never  act- 
ually visited  the  Celestial  City,  yet  seemed  as  well  ac- 
quainted with  its  laws,  customs,  policy,  and  -statistics 
as  with  those  of  the  City  of  Destruction,  of  which 
he  was  a  native  townsman.  Being,  moreover,  a 
director  of  the  railroad  corporation,  and  one  of  its 
largest  stockholders,  he  had  it  in  his  power  to  give  me 
all  desirable  information  respecting  that  praiseworthy 
enterprise. 


BUNYAN  213 

And  thus  Mr.  Smooth-it-away,  as  they  speed 
along,  points  out  how  the  road  has  been  made 
safe.  Apollyon  drives  the  engine ;  across  the  old 
Slough  of  Despond  a  bridge  has  been  thrown,  sup- 
ported on  a  foundation  of  suitable  philosophy ; 
Vanity  Fair  is  a  pleasant  and  salubrious  town, 
in  which  passengers  may  stop  over  for  a  few 
days — and  so  on  through  a  chapter  of  foolery 
worthy  of  Franklin  for  its  wit,  however  its 
satire  would  have  fallen  pointless  upon  that 
magnificent  and  complacent  citizen  of  the  new 
world.  He,  like  most  of  us  to-day  who  are  his 
children,  would  have  felt  more  at  his  ease  on 
that  celestial  railway  with  Mr.  Smooth-it-away 
than  with  Christian  and  his  comrades  in  the 
strait  and  narrow  path.  It  is  true  that  the 
modem  pilgrim  had  his  qualms  of  doubt  when 
he  was  carried  headlong  over  the  quaking  pit 
and  through  the  dark  valley. 


ROUSSEAU 

We  are  perhaps  hearing  too  much  of  Rousseau 
these  days,  and  he  threatens  to  become  a  kind 
of  fetich  of  criticism.  To  the  French  he  is, 
more  than  any  other  one  man,  the  author  of 
the  Revolution  with  all  the  subsequent  good  or 
evil  implied  in  that  movement.  And  now  the 
Germans  have  discovered  in  him  the  father  of 
their  romanticism.  "In  reality  his  influence 
is  accomplished  on  German  soil,"  says  Paul 
Hensel  in  the  latest  monograph  on  the  subject; 
"here  Rousseau  was  not  the  basis  of  a  guillo- 
tine, but  of  a  new  culture,  .  .  .  Kant  and  Herder, 
Goethe  and  Schiller  are  not  to  be  conceived 
without  Rousseau,  and  through  them  is  formed 
the  new  science,  the  new  philosophy,  the  new 
poetry  of  German  idealism."  One  has  an  im- 
pulse to  avoid  a  theme  that  has  grown  cheap 
from  too  much  writing  of  this  sort;  but  how 
escape  the  writer  who  gathered  up  in  himself 
the  floating  ideas  of  his  age,  and,  by  simplifying 
them  to  a  portable  creed  and  infusing  into  them 
the  carrying  power  of  his  own  great  personality, 
made  them  the  chief  formative  influence  down 
to  our  own  times? 

214 


ROUSSEAU  215 

Only  by  keeping  in  view  this  new  emotional 
element  can  we  understand  how  the  intellectual 
life  of  to-day  has  its  source  in  Rousseau  more 
than  in  any  other  single  man,  for  the  ideas 
themselves — liberty  and  progress  and  natural 
'  religion  and  innate  goodness — were  in  no  wise 
original  with  him.  If,  indeed,  disregarding 
the  complexities  of  a  civilisation  and  obscurer 
influences,  we  undertake  to  analyse  the  revolu- 
tion of  the  eighteenth  century,  we  shall  find 
that  the  guiding  principles  and  the  original 
dynamic  impulse  of  the  age  came  from  England, 
that  the  translation  of  these  into  a  homogene- 
ous social  law  was  the  work  of  France,  and  that 
their  conversion  into  a  metaphysical  formula 
was  finally  accomplished  by  Germany.  Cer- 
tainly, the  starting  place  of  this  movement, 
the  caldron,  so  to  speak,  in  which  this  great 
fermentation  began,  was  the  turbulent  England 
of  the  seventeenth  century.  There,  the  notion 
of  liberty  took  practical  form  in  the  acts  of  the 
Rebellion  and  the  Revolution  and  in  the  writ- 
ings of  such  republicans  as  Algernon  Sidney. 
Is  it  not  almost,  if  not  quite,  the  accent  of 
Rousseau's  Contrat  Social  we  hear  in  Sidney's 
brave  reply  to  Hobbes  and  Filmer:  "If  men 
are  naturally  free,  such  as  have  wisdom  and 
understanding  will  always  frame  good  govern- 
ments; but  if  they  are  bom  under  the  necessity 
of  a  perpetual  slavery,  no  wisdom  can  be  of  use 


2l6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

to  them  "  ?  Certainly,  too,  the  most  fecund  idea 
taken  over  by  the  nineteenth  century  from  its 
predecessor,  the  conception  of  indefinite  moral 
progress  based  on  the  accumulating  knowledge 
of  physical  laws,  had  been  proclaimed  by  Bacon 
with  the  grandiose  fervour  of  a  Hebrew  prophet. 
And  the  accompanying  change  of  religion  from  a 
belief  in  superrational  revelation  to  a  rational 
deism  was  also  formulated  in  England.  It  was 
Lord  Herbert  of  Cherbury  who,  as  far  back  as 
1624  in  his  De  Veritate,  gave  the  first  clear  exposi- 
tion of  religion  as  the  product  of  a  purely  natural 
instinct.  Later  he  resolved  this  religious  instinct 
into  five  theses  which  became  the  "charter  of 
the  deists,"  and  which  may  be  found  simplified 
and  summed  up  in  the  three  articles  of  Chubb's 
True  Gospel.  There  is,  if  we  may  believe  that 
inspired  tallow-chandler  of  Salisbury,  no  demand 
in  the  Gospel  for  subscribing  to  a  supernatural 
scheme  of  salvation,  nor  is  the  new  birth  any- 
thing more  than  a  "figure  of  speech."  On  the 
contrary,  "the  Gospel  of  Christ  is  a  plain,  simple, 
uniform  thing,"  as  thus: 

First,  he  [Christ]  requires  and  recommends  [note  the 
curiously  unreligious  word]  a  conformity  of  mind  and 
life  to  that  eternal  and  unalterable  rule  of  action  which 
is  founded  in  the  reason  of  things,  and  makes  or  de- 
clares that  compliance  to  be  the  only,  and  the  sole 
ground  of  divine  acceptance,  and  the  only,  and  the 
sure  way  to  life  eternal.     Secondly,  if  men  have  lived 


ROUSSEAU  217 

in  a  violation  of  this  righteous  law,  by  which  they  have 
rendered  themselves  displeasing  to  God,  and  worthy 
of  his  just  resentment;  then  Christ  requires  and  recom- 
mends repentance  and  reformation  of  their  evil  ways 
as  the  only,  and  the  sure  grounds  of  the  divine  mercy 
and  forgiveness.  And  Thirdly,  Christ  assures  us 
that  God  has  appointed  a  time  in  which  he  will  judge 
the  world  in  righteousness,  and  that  he  will  then  ap- 
prove or  condemn,  reward  or  punish  every  man 
according  to  his  works.  > 

It  is  worth  while  to  quote  this  remarkably 
lucid  summary  of  deism,  unobscured  as  it  is  by 
the  glamour  of  the  imagination  thrown  over 
the  creed  by  Shaftesbury  and  his  school,  if 
only  to   show  how  closely  Rousseau,  who  was 

•  If  Chubb  won  applause  by  depriving  faith  of  its 
superrational  elements,  a  greater  contemporary, 
Toland,  exerted  all  his  powers  to  explode  what  he 
deemed  the  fallacy  of  the  religious  imagination.  The 
very  title  of  his  chief  work,  Christianity  Not  Mysterious: 
or,  a  Treatise  Showing  that  there  is  nothing  in  the  Gospel 
Contrary  to  Reason,  nor  Above  it:  and  that  no  Christian 
Doctrine  can  be  properly  call'd  a  Mystery,  would  seem 
to  be  a  challenge  to  Sir  Thomas  Browne.  This  is  not 
to  say  that  in  the  poetry  and  philosophy  inspired  by 
deism  there  is  no  proper  use  of  the  imagination.  That 
faculty,  as  the  power  which  renders  concrete  and  real, 
visible  so  to  speak  to  the  inner  eye,  the  intellectual 
and  spiritual  life  of  man,  varies  in  action  as  the  life 
to  which  it  administers  varies.  In  the  work  of  deistic 
writers  it  is  closely  akin  to  its  use  by  the  scientific 
mind,  though  it  may  be  lacking  in  the  positive  utilita- 
rian advantages  of  science. 


2l8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

well-read  in  these  authors,  adhered  to  his 
sources.  Here,  in  a  paragraph,  is  the  whole 
skeleton  of  the  Profession  de  foi.  And  here  in 
few  words  is,  without  the  surrender  of  a  religious 
semblance  altogether,  the  last  and  inevitable 
stage  of  that  Pelagianism  against  which  St. 
Augustine  had  for  the  time  inveighed  so  suc- 
cessfully and  under  which  the  Port-Royal  of 
Pascal  was  at  last  beaten  down. 

It  is  by  no  means  easy  to  trace  the  evolution 
of  our  secular  belief  in  the  essential  goodness 
of  human  nature.  It  was  implicit,  no  doubt, 
in  the  first  contention  of  Pelagianism  that 
salvation  is  primarily  the  work  of  man,  but  it 
has  become  the  driving  force  of  society  only 
since  the  notion  of  a  needed  reconciliation 
with  God  has  been  quite  eliminated.  Nor  was 
it  a  product  of  the  Renaissance  in  so  far  as  that 
movement  implied  a  return  to  the  past.  Total 
depravity  may  have  been  Christian  and  medi- 
aeval; but  total  goodness  can  find  no  authority 
in  the  classical  writers  of  Greece  and  Rome, 
and  is,  in  fact,  the  mark  of  modern  human- 
itarianism  as  distinguished  from  Renaissance 
humanism.  It  should  seem  to  be  rather  a 
secularisation  of  mediaeval  theology,  if  such  a 
term  is  not  self-contradictory.  Grant  the 
longing  for  personal  justification  and  supreme 
bliss  which  passed  from  the  Middle  Ages  into 
the   freer   emotional   life   of   the   Renaissance, 


ROUSSEAU  219 

take  away  the  supernatural  scheme  of  redemp- 
tion, and  the  Pelagian  confidence  in  man's 
ability  to  satisfy  God  might  easily  pass  into  a 
belief  that  human  nature,  being  essentially 
right,  has  within  itself  the  power  to  expand 
indefinitely,  without  any  act  of  renunciation, 
toward  some  far-off,  vaguely-glimpsed,  "divine 
event." 

The  ideas  of  progress  and  innate  goodness 
are  thus  companions;  they  sprang  up  side 
by  side  with  humanism,  but  they  are  not  a 
product  of  the  classical  revival  in  the  sense  that 
humanism  was  such  a  revival,  and  in  the  end 
they  killed  humanism.  Nothing  is  more  curious 
throughout  the  seventeenth  and  the  first  half  of 
the  eighteenth  century  than  the  way  in  which 
the  contradictory  notions  of  essential  evil  and 
essential  goodness  alternate  with  each  other, 
sometimes  in  the  same  writer.  The  neo-classi- 
cists  as  a  rule,  the  great  human  moralists  of 
France,  have  no  doubt  of  the  inherent  selfish- 
ness and  depravity  of  the  human  heart;  and  a 
pure  sceptic  like  Bayle,  at  a  time  when  deism 
was  in  full  vein,  can  still  be  absolutely  convinced 
that  "man  is  incomparably  more  drawn  to 
evil  than  to  good."  The  English  deists  on  the 
other  hand  were  necessarily  driven  to  believe 
in  man's  native  soundness;  for  what  indeed 
is  the  excuse  for  natural  religion  if  nature  is 
estranged  from  the  supreme  good?     Yet  even 


220  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

here  there  are  strange  compromises  and  incon- 
sistencies. A  Bolingbroke  might  preach  philo- 
sophically that  this  is  the  best  of  worlds,  but 
as  a  politician  and  somewhat  deeply  versed 
man  of  the  world  he  treated  mankind  with  a 
perfectly  cynical  distrust.  Nowhere  does  this 
contrast  glare  more  impudently  than  in  Pope, 
who  learnt  his  satire  from  Dryden  and  the  neo- 
classicists  and  his  optimism  from  Bolingbroke 
and  the  deists ;  and  Pope,  it  must  be  remembered, 
was  accepted  seriously  as  a  moral  teacher  not 
only  in  England  but  in  France  and  Germany 
as  well.  Nothing  is  more  bewildering  than  to 
read  Pope's  general  justification  of  human 
passions  and  instincts  in  his  Essay  on  Man 
and  then  in  the  same  poem  to  find  his  scathing 
denunciation  of  these  passions  in  a  Bacon  or  a 
Gripus  [his  friend  Mr.  Wortley  Montagu].  On 
one  page  we  find  this  pleasant  optimism  : 

The  surest  virtues  thus  from  passions  shoot, 
Wild  Nature's  vigour  working  at  the  root; 

but  turn  the  leaf  and  all  is  changed: 

As  man,  perhaps,  the  moment  of  his  breath, 
Receives  the  lurking  principle  of  death; 
The  young  disease,  that  must  subdue  at  length, 
Grows   with    his    growth    and    strengthens   with    his 

strength ; 
So,  cast  and  mingled  with  his  very  frame, 
The  mind's  disease,  its  ruling  passion  came. 


ROUSSEAU  221 

Pope  might  try  to  carry  this  double-faced  atti- 
tude ofiE  under  the  effrontery  of  assuming  an 
enormous  paradox  in  the  nature  of  things,  but 
it  was  in  truth  a  real  inconsistency  due  to  the 
confusion  of  two  diverse  tendencies  of  thought. 
Did  not  Voltaire  also,  the  spokesman  of  the 
age,  pass  his  life  ridiculing  the  pretensions  of 
mankind  to  virtue  and  at  the  same  time  ad- 
vocating the  liberation  of  mankind  from  the 
restraints  that  would  keep  vice  within  bounds? 
It  required  more  than  one  century  to  root  out 
the  ancient  conviction  that  the  heart  of  man 
is  naturally  disposed  to  evil. 

Meanwhile,  it  is  clear  that  these  dominating 
ideas  of  the  age,  whether  they  received  their 
vital  force  from  England  or  France  or  elsewhere, 
all  imply  a  denial  of  that  sense  of  dualism  which 
hitherto  had  lain  at  the  base  of  religion  and 
philosophy,  and  that  lacking  this  sense  they 
seem  always  to  be  shirking  certain  of  the  more 
troublesome  problems  of  life.  The  artificiality 
of  that  literature  has  become  a  proverb.  This 
is  not  to  say  that  the  eighteenth  century  did 
not  have  its  own  theories  of  dualism.  There 
was  in  Germany,  for  instance,  that  amusing 
doctrine  of  the  harmonia  prcBStabilita,  spun  by 
a  discursive  wit  who  imposed  on  the  world  as  a 
profound  philosopher.  "The  soul,"  says  Leib- 
nitz, "follows  its  proper  laws,  and  the  body 
likewise  follows  those  which  are  proper  to  it. 


222  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

and  they  meet  in  virtue  of  the  preestablished 
harmony  which  exists  between  all  substances, 
as  representations  of  one  and  the  same  universe." 
According  to  which  system,  "bodies  act  as  if 
there  were  no  souls,  and  souls  act  as  if  there  were 
no  bodies,  and  yet  both  act  as  though  the  one 
influenced  the  other,"  etc.  But  these  vagaries 
of  a  mechanical  parallelism  are,  so  to  speak, 
a  by-product  of  the  age,  developed  from  the 
metaphysics  of  Descartes,  aside  from  the  natural- 
istic influences  of  England.  The  dominating 
line  of  thought  runs  from  Newton  and  Locke,  ^ 

» As  early  as  1694,  La  Fontaine  had  felt  the  power 
of  the  new  English  philosophy: 

.  .  .  Les  Anglais  pensent  profond6ment  : 
Leur  esprit,  en  cela,  suit  leur  temperament; 
Creusant  tous  les  sujets  et  forts  d'  experiences, 
lis  etendent  partout   I'empire   des  sciences. 

Buckle  in  his  History  of  Civilisation  has  an  elo- 
quent chapter  on  the  influence  of  England  at  this 
time  upon  France,  and  Joseph  Texte  has  elaborated 
this  thesis  into  a  well-known  volume,  Jean-Jacques 
Rousseau,  et  les  origines  du  cosmopolitisme  litteraire. 
Neither  of  these  writers,  so  far  as  I  remember,  brings 
out  the  curious  fact  that  just  when  England  was 
borrowing  its  literary  form  from  France  the  trend  in 
philosophy  was  in  the  opposite  direction.  From  the 
time  of  Voltaire's  Lettres  anglaises  (1733),  Newton 
and  Locke  may  be  called  the  fathers  par  excellence  of  the 
new  philosophie.  I  have  dwelt  solely  on  the  English 
sources  of  Rousseau  because  there,  I  think,  lies  the 


ROUSSEAU  223 

who  formulated  the  laws  of  nature  in  the  physical 
world  and  in  the  human  intellect,  through  the 
French  philosophes,  to  Condillac,  who  banishes 
dualism  so  far  as  to  derive  the  whole  man,  in- 
cluding Locke's  reflective  faculty,  the  moral 
sense,  and  consciousness,  from  the  effect  of 
physical  impact. 

One  thing  was  wanting  to  all  these  theories — 
to  the  dead  parallelism  of  Leibnitz,  to  the  moral 
rationalism  of  Toland  and  Chubb,  to  Shaftes- 
bury's florid  deism  of  the  imagination,  to  the 
cynical  or  boisterous  philosophy  of  Voltaire 
and  Diderot — they  all  excluded  the  sense  of 
that  deep  cleft  within  the  human  soul  itself, 
which  springs  from  the  bitter  consciousness  of 
evil.  This,  in  a  way,  Rousseau  supplied,  and 
through  him  what  was  a  theme  of  speculation 
for  the  few  was  vivified  into  a  new  gospel. 

How  thoroughly  Rousseau  was  a  child  of  his 
age  is  proved  by  the  continual  recurrence  of 
English  names  in  his  works.  Intellectually, 
he  has  little  that  is  original;  his  deism,  his 
passion  for  liberty,  his  doctrine  of  instinctive 
goodness,  are  all  avowedly  from  over  the  sea, 
and  even  his  minor  ideas  can,  for  the  most  part, 
be  traced  to  various  predecessors.  It  was  because 
he  made  all  these  subservient  to  a  passionate 

dynamic  derivation;  this  is  not  to  deny  that  many 
of  his  ideas  can  be  found  in  contemporary  and  preced- 
ing French  authors. 


224  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

proclamation  of  a  dualism  between  the  individ- 
ual and  society,  between  nature  and  art,  that 
he  became  so  powerfully  provocative  of  change. 
In  a  way,  even  this  dogma —  for  it  is  as  arbitrary 
a  dogma  as  any  set  up  by  St.  Augustine — was 
not  his  own.  It  may  be  found  implicit  in 
English  deism,  in  the  discrepancy  between 
Pope's  praise  of  the  savage,  to  whom  "full 
instinct  is  the  unerring  guide,"  and  his  satire 
of  a  malignant  society;  it  underlies  the  Night 
Thoughts  of  Young: 

.  .  .  These  tutelary  shades 
Are  man's  asylum  from  the  tainted   throng; 

it  could  even,  in  a  later  day,  temper  the  rigid 
orthodoxy  of  Cowper: 

God  made  the  country,  and  man  made  the  town. 

In  his  Fable  of  the  Bees  Mandeville  had  given  it 
an  odd  twist  by  vindicating  the  old  notion  of 
inherent  evil  and  making  the  progress  of  society 
depend  on  this  corruption  of  the  individual. 
But  these  were  unfruitful  hints  and  thoughtless 
inconsistencies;  they  became  a  social  force 
through  the  temperament  of  one  man  who,  as 
Madame  de  Stael  said,  discovered  perhaps  no- 
thing, but  set  everything  ablaze. 

From  lonely  brooding  on  his  own  divided 
self,  Rousseau  was  led  to  erect  the  dualism  im- 
plicit in  the  philosophy  of  his  day  into  a  formula 
with  all  the  popular  persuasiveness  of  a  religion. 


ROUSSEAU  225 

The  Pelagian  doctrine  of  man's  potential  good- 
ness united  with  his  intense  egotism  to  create 
the  idea  of  the  individual,  conceived  in  himself 
and  unmodified  by  others,  as  a  pure  uncontami- 
nated  product  of  nature.  He,  Rousseau,  was, 
he  felt,  by  his  instincts  good,  yet  he  was  pain- 
fully aware  of  his  actual  lapses  into  turpitude 
and  shame ;  he  could  only  shift  the  responsibility 
of  this  corruption  upon  outside  influences. 
Here  was  no  room  for  the  Augustinian  ideali- 
sation of  the  good  in  man  as  an  infinite  God  set 
over  against  the  finite  and  hence  erring  natural 
man,  nor  for  the  conception  of  man  as  bearing 
within  himself  infinitely  diverse  promptings 
toward  good  and  evil ;  on  the  contrary,  he  was 
driven  to  the  idealisation  of  his  own  person- 
ality, and  of  every  personality  in  so  far  as  he 
projected  himself  into  another,  as  good,  and 
of  other  personalities,  in  so  far  as  they  are  hostile 
to  him  and  limit  or  pervert  his  native  proclivities, 
as  evil.  Hence  the  dualism  of  the  individual  re- 
garded in  the  state  of  nature  and  in  the  state 
of  society,  of  the  one  and  the  many  without 
the  old  accompaniment  of  the  infinite  and  the 
finite.^     And  evil  to  Rousseau  was  not  a  thing 

>  Gustave  Lanson,  in  his  Histoire  de  la  litterature 
frangaise,  has  with  great  shrewdness  developed  this 
antinomy  of  the  individual  and  the  State  running 
through  all  Rousseau's  works,  but  he  has  not  analysed 
its  philosophic  causes  and  consequences. 

15 


226  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  jest  and  satire,  but,  by  the  whole  weight 
of  his  emotional  being,  a  power  to  be  feared 
and  spurned.  As  embodied  in  society  it  looms 
up  in  his  writings  like  some  living  and  malign 
monster,  lying  in  wait  to  corrupt  and  de- 
stroy the  unwary  individual.  It  is  the  Devil 
of  the  mediaeval  monks  reborn  in  the  height 
of  the  boastful  age  of  reason  to  trouble  the 
consciences  of  men,  for  who  can  say  how  long 
a  time. 

The  first  serious  work  of  Rousseau  was  the 
prize  essay,  written  at  the  age  of  thirty-eight, 
on  the  question  proposed  by  the  Academy  of 
Dijon  as  to  Whether  the  Progress  of  Science  and 
Art  has  Contributed  to  Corrupt  or  Purify  Morals. 
Either  by  the  advice  of  Diderot  or,  more  prob- 
ably, by  the  natural  bent  of  his  mind,  he  there 
advocated  the  thesis,  by  no  means  so  novel  as  he 
seems  to  have  believed,  that  civilisation  results 
in  the  perversion  of  society.  It  is  at  best  a 
slight  academic  exercise,  but  it  fell  in  with  the 
mood  of  the  day  sufficiently  to  arouse  discussion, 
and  gave  the  author  a  position  to  defend.  Five 
years  later,  in  1755,  he  published  his  Discourse 
on  Inequality,  in  which  this  theory  is  found 
fully  developed.  Here  we  have  the  picture 
of  primitive  man,  living  in  solitude,  mating  by 
chance,  and  following  undisturbed  his  healthy 
animal  instincts.  The  first  law  of  nature  is 
love  of  self,  and  in  this  paradise  of  primeval 


ROUSSEAU  227 

isolation  there  is  nothing  to  distort  that  innocent 
impulse.  When  by  chance  man  meets  with 
man  he  is  kept  from  wrongdoing  by  the  feeling 
of  sympathy  and  pity  which  is,  after  the  instinct 
of  self-preservation,  the  second  law  of  nature. 
But — "The  first  man  who,  having  enclosed 
some  land,  thought  of  saying  'this  is  mine,'  and 
found  people  simple  enough  to  believe  him,  was 
the  real  founder  of  civilised  society.  How 
many  crimes,  wars,  murders,  how  many  miseries 
and  horrors  would  have  been  spared  human 
nature  had  some  one  snatched  away  the  stakes, 
or  filled  in  the  ditch,  calling  out  to  his  neigh- 
bours: 'Beware  of  listening  to  this  impostor '  !"^ 
With  the  acknowledgment  of  property  comes  the 
division  of  more  and  less  out  of  which  springs 
all  the  brood  of  ambitions,  crimes,  penalties. 
Sympathy  is  stifled  in  envy,  and  harmless 
amour  de  soi-meme  is  converted  into  that  social 

>  The  translation  of  this  famous  passage  is  taken 
from  Jean-Jacques  Rousseau,  by  Jules  Lemaitre, 
translated  by  Jeanne  Mairet.  [(New  York :  The  McClure 
Co.)  M.  Lemaitre's  lectures  have  all  the  bitterness  of 
a  converted  Rousselian.  He  displays  extreme  clever- 
ness in  deriving  all  Rousseau's  theories  from  personal 
weaknesses  and  vanities,  showing  in  this  perhaps  a  lit- 
tle too  much  of  the  animosity  of  a  renegade.  As  a 
critical  work  it  is  not  significant,  except  in  so  far  as  it 
is  a  sign  that  some  of  the  best-instructed  minds  of 
France  are  turning  away  from  the  romanticism  of 
Rousseau  in  which  they  were  schooled. 


228  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

disease  amour-propre;  in  a  word,  property  means 
society.  There  is  nothing  fanciful  in  comparing 
this  marvellous  change  from  the  individual  in 
a  state  of  natural  innocence  to  the  same  individ- 
ual as  corrupted  by  society  with  the  theological 
doctrine  of  the  Fall.  They  are  both  an  attempt 
to  transfer  the  inexplicable  dualism  within  the 
heart  of  man  to  some  ancient  mythological 
event;  nor  does  Rousseau  denounce  the  evil 
introduced  by  property  with  less  unctuous  and 
priestly  fervour  than  was  used  by  a  Bossuet  in 
laying  bare  the  depths  of  total  depravity.  For 
the  rest  of  his  life  he  merely  developed  in  various 
ways  the  thesis  of  his  Discourse  on  Inequality. 
As  he  said  himself  at  the  end  of  his  career, 
speaking  of  his  own  works: 

Following  as  best  I  could  the  thread  of  his  medita- 
tions, I  saw  everywhere  the  development  of  his  main 
principle,  that  nature  has  made  man  happy  and  good, 
but  that  society  depraves  him  and  renders  him  miser- 
able. And  particularly  Entile,  that  book  so  much 
read,  so  little  understood,  and  so  ill  appreciated,  is 
nothing  but  a  treatise  on  the  original  goodness  of  man, 
with  the  aim  of  showing  how  vice  and  error,  strangers 
to  his  constitution,  are  introduced  from  without  and 
imperceptibly  work  a  change. 

In  reality  Emile  is  something  more  than  a 
treatise  on  original  goodness;  it  is  an  elaborate 
plea  for  a  form  of  education  by  which  the  indiv- 
idual may  be  rescued  from  the  perverting  influ- 


ROUSSEAU  229 

ences  of  society  and  restored  to  his  primitive  state 
of  innocence.  It  is  thus  in  a  manner  to  the  Dis- 
course what  Paradise  Regained  is  to  Paradise 
Lost.  The  instincts  implanted  in  the  child  by 
nature  are  right ;  therefore  the  aim  of  education 
is  to  place  the  child  in  such  a  position  that  these 
instincts  may  develop  freely  without  any 
thwarting  control  from  master  or  society.  To 
this  end  he  separates  his  typical  child  Emile 
from  family  and  comrades,  and  gives  him  a 
home  in  the  country  with  a  guardian,  whose 
duty  is,  not  to  instruct,  but  to  preserve  him 
from  physical  accidents,  and  to  act  as  a  kind  of 
concealed  Providence.  Books  during  his  early 
years  are  eschewed;  all  information  is  brought 
to  the  boy  through  the  pleasure  of  observing 
natural  processes  and  through  play  cunningly 
directed  to  manual  training.  Such  a  plan  is, 
as  Rousseau  willingly  acknowledged,  impossible 
except  for  a  favoured  few,  if  not  for  all ;  but  as 
an  ideal  toward  which  education  might  tend,  it 
has  exercised  through  the  theories  of  Pestalozzi, 
Froebel,  and  other  German  pedagogues  an 
enormous  influence,  and  is  still  to-day  the 
inspiration  of  most  writers  on  education.  In 
part  the  book  is  admirably  wise ;  in  its  provision 
for  training  the  body,  in  many  other  details, 
even,  one  gladly  admits,  in  its  opposition  to 
an  unreasoning  system  of  compression,  it  was 
not  only  a  wholesome  reaction  from  the  practice 


230  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  the  day,  but  is  full  of  suggestions  of  perma- 
nent value.  But  there  is  a  growing  belief  among 
a  certain  class  that  the  fundamental  thesis  of 
the  book  has  worked,  and  is  still  working,  like 
a  poison  in  the  blood  of  society.^  To  make 
instinct  instead  of  experienced  judgment  the 
basis  of  education,  impulse  instead  of  control, 
unbridled  liberty  instead  of  obedience,  nature 
instead  of  discipline,  to  foster  the  emotions 
as  if  the  uniting  bond  of  mankind  were  senti- 
ment rather  than  reason,  might  seem  of  itself 
so  monstrous  a  perversion  of  the  truth  as  to 

•  The  latest  book  on  Entile  available  in  English  is 
Gabriel  Compayre's  Jean- Jacques  Rousseau  and  Edu- 
cation from  Nature,  translated  by  R.  P.  Jago  (New 
York:  Thomas  Y.  Crowell  &  Co.).  This  belongs  to  a 
series  of  Pioneers  in  Education,  of  which  volumes  on 
Pestalozzi,  Herbart,  Horace  Mann,  Spencer,  and  Mon- 
taigne have  already  appeared,  besides  the  Rousseau. 
M.  Compayre,  like  most  professional  students  of  peda- 
gogics, is  a  convinced  Rousseauist.  He  finds  much 
that  is  impracticable  or  perverted  in  the  details  of 
Entile,  but  regards  its  total  inspiration  as  wholesome. 
"We  cannot,  indeed,"  he  says,  "hope  to  derive  from 
Rousseau's  pedagogics  a  definite  and  final  system  of 
methods  and  procedure.  But  what  is  perhaps  better, 
he  handed  on  to  his  successors  and  still  imparts  to  all 
who  read  him  a  spark,  at  least,  of  the  flame  which 
burned  in  him."  To  the  critics,  on  the  contrary,  who 
look  more  deeply  and  dispassionately  into  human  nature 
than  is  common  with  the  specialist  in  pedagogics,  it 
is  just  this  flame  which  is  beginning  to  be  regarded  as 
dangerous. 


ROUSSEAU  231 

awaken  abhorrence  in  any  considerate  reader. 
And,  indeed,  these  notions  were  slow  in  making 
their  way  against  long-established  traditions. 
Yet  so  honorable  is  the  name  of  liberty,  even 
when  it  is  a  mask  for  license,  so  flattering  is  the 
appeal  to  the  individual's  desire  of  unchecked  au- 
tonomy, that  Rousseau's  "education  of  nature" 
has  deeply  modified,  if  it  has  not  entirely  trans- 
formed, the  practice  of  our  schools.  It  is  seen 
at  work  in  the  vagaries  of  the  elective  system, 
in  the  advocating  of  manual  training  as  an 
equivalent  for  books,  in  the  unbounded  enthu- 
siasm for  nature-study,  in  the  encroachment 
of  science  on  the  character-discipline  of  the 
humanities,  in  the  general  substitution  of  per- 
suasion for  authority.  To  some  observers  cer- 
tain traits  of  irresponsibility  in  the  individual 
and  certain  symptoms  of  disintegration  in  so- 
ciety are  the  direct  fruit  of  this  teaching. 

To  find  the  source  of  the  nature-cult  raised  by 
Rousseau  to  so  predominant  a  place  in  imagi- 
native literature  it  might  seem  sufficient  to  go 
back  to  English  naturalism,  and  no  doubt  many 
pages  of  the  Nouvelle  Heloise  and  of  Emile  were 
in  this  respect  inspired  by  Shaftesbury  and 
Thomson  and  the  other  deists.  More  particu- 
larly The  Wanderer  (1729)  of  Richard  Savage 
and  that  strange  and  neglected  book,  The  Life 
of  John  Buncle  (published  in  1756,  five  years 
before  the  Nouvelle  Heloise),  are  filled  with  a 


232  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Rousselian  mixture  of  deistic  enthusiasm  and 
grandiose  eloquence  on  the  aspect  of  romantic 
mountain  scenery.  But  there  is  withal  a  new- 
accent  in  Rousseau,  which  derives  its  pene- 
trating quality  from  his  developed  dualism  of 
the  individual  and  society,  and  which  renders 
him  the  true  father  of  modern  nature- writing. 
Man  before  the  social  Fall  was  a  compound  of 
harmless  self-love  and  sentimental  sympathy. 
Whoever  seeks  any  spark  of  this  innocence  in 
an  age  when  self-love  is  changed  to  egotism  and 
sympathy  to  envy  must  go  out  from  society 
and  make  his  peace  alone  with  Nature.  There, 
by  a  pathetic  fallacy,  the  sympathy  which  he 
vainly  demands  of  men  flows  to  him  freely 
from  the  beauty  and  solitude  of  the  inanimate 
world;  there  he  meets  no  contrary  will  to  frus- 
trate his  own,  nothing  to  prevent  him  from 
personifying  his  emotions  in  some  alter-ego 
that  smiles  at  him  benignly  from  field  and 
brook,  echoes  his  loneliness,  and  weeps  with 
his  self-pity. 

From  this  it  is  but  a  step  to  the  religion  of 
Nature.  Everybody  is  familiar  with  the  scene 
in  Emile  where  the  Savoyard  vicar  leads  his 
young  friend  at  sunrise  to  a  hill  rising  above 
the  fair  valley  of  the  Po  and  looking  off  afar  to 
the  chain  of  the  Alps,  and  there  in  language  of 
melting  charm  expounds  his  profession  of  faith. 
There  is  much  that  is  discordant  in  the  ideas 


ROUSSEAU  233 

of  that  document.  The  retention  of  the  old 
belief  in  a  heaven  and  hell  has  no  justification  in 
Rousseau's  theory  of  man's  essential  goodness, 
and  in  fact  might  without  injury  be  removed 
from  his  profession.  The  gist  of  his  faith  is  a 
pure  deism,  a  trustful  reliance  on  some  benefi- 
cent God  who  is  united  with  Nature  by  a  mut- 
ual sympathy  corresponding  to  that  which  he 
himself  feels,  and  who  is  in  fact  no  more  than 
a  magnified  projection  of  his  own  innocent 
personality  into  the  infinite  void — himself  and 
Nature,  God  and  Nature.  Beyond  this  is  no 
need  of  dogma  or  revelation  or  faith.  Rousseau 
felt  the  instability  of  such  a  religion,  and  recom- 
mended a  compliance  with  the  popular  forms  of 
worship  in  whatever  land  a  man  might  be,  as 
a  guide  and  stay,  so  to  speak,  to  this  vague 
emotionalism.  It  is  a  pretty  theory,  not  with- 
out its  advantages,  and  has  warmed  the  fancy  of 
more  than  one  poet  to  noble  utterance.  But  it 
has  one  insurmountable  element  of  weakness. 
It  depends  for  its  strength,  for  its  very  vitality, 
on  the  more  precise  faith  of  those  whose  worship 
it  adopts.  So  long  as  these  believe  energetically 
in  the  virtue  of  forms  and  creeds,  your  deist 
may  prey  upon  their  emotions;  but  a  lasting 
church  made  up  of  deists  is  inconceivable.  Rous- 
seau's deism  in  fact  came  toward  the  end  and 
not  at  the  beginning  of  a  movement;  it  flashed 
out  into  a  grotesque  worship  of  the  Etre  Supreme 


234  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

at  the  Revolution,  but  it  has  had  no  permanent 
and  fruitful  results.  Rousseau  has,  more  than 
any  other  one  man,  given  us  our  religion  of  to- 
day, but  it  is  a  religion  of  the  State,  and  not  of 
God. 

That  change  from  theology  to  sociology  is 
announced  in  the  most  radical  of  his  works, 
"There  is  then,"  he  says,  "a  profession  of 
faith  purely  civil  of  which  it  pertains  to  the 
sovereign  [people]  to  fix  the  principles,  not 
exactly  as  dogmas  of  religion,  but  as  sentiments 
of  sociability  without  which  it  is  impossible 
to  be  a  good  citizen  or  a  faithful  subject."  The 
determining  principle  of  this  creed  is  the  sanctity 
of  the  Social  Contract  as  he  has  developed  it  in 
his  treatise  of  that  name.  Man,  he  declares  in 
his  opening  sentence,  with  that  precision  and 
vehemence  that  have  made  his  words  the  battle 
cry  of  revolution — "man  is  born  free,  and 
everywhere  he  is  in  chains."  Property  has 
introduced  a  harsh  inequality  among  men, 
and  established  those  conventions  of  society 
upon  which  rests  the  right  of  the  stronger. 
There  is  but  one  way  in  which  liberty  can  be 
restored:  society  itself  must  be  transformed 
into  a  composite  individual  equivalent  so  far 
as  possible  to  the  isolated  individual  in  the  state 
of  nature.  That  is  the  work  of  the  Social 
Contract.  His  theories  reduce  themselves  to 
this  single  proposition: 


ROUSSEAU  235 

The  complete  alienation  of  each  associate  with  all 
his  rights  to  the  whole  community;  for,  in  the  first 
place,  each  man  giving  himself  entirely,  the  condition 
is  equal  for  all;  and,  the  condition  being  equal  for 
all,  no  one  has  any  interest  in  rendering  it  burdensome 
to  the  others  [oh,  most  holy  innocence!]  ....  Each 
of  us  places  his  person  and  all  his  power  in  common 
under  the  supreme  direction  of  the  general  will,  and 
we  receive  back  each  member  as  an  indivisible  part 
of  the  whole. 

It  would  not  be  fair  to  say  that  Rousseau  him- 
self was  unaware  of  the  absurdity  in  supposing 
that  all  men,  granted  even  that  the  nature  of 
humanity  is  essentially  good,  will  thus  surrender 
their  separate  desires  and  ambitions  to  this 
phantom  of  the  common  interest;  he  endeav- 
ours to  obviate  such  criticism  by  a  shadowy 
distinction  between  the  volonte  generate  and 
the  volonte  de  tons,  and  indeed,  it  must  be 
remembered  that  always  he  has  in  mind 
an  ideal  rather  than  any  facile  and  probable 
revolution.  At  bottom  his  proposal  comes  to 
this:  by  some  persuasion  of  a  divine  legis- 
lator [he  has  an  eye  on  himself]  or  some  inter- 
vention of  Providence  that  sense  of  sympathy, 
which  we  found  in  the  natural  man  along  with 
a  harmless  self-love,  may  miraculously  take  pos- 
session of  mankind,  now  corrupted  by  society 
into  a  conglomeration  of  warring  egotisms, 
and  transform  that  society  itself  into  a  quasi 
individual  with  a  single  purpose  and  a  single 


236  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

will;  and  so  the  antinomy  of  the  one  and  the 
many  shall  be  finally  solved.  It  is  a  vain  Utopia 
or  a  prophecy  of  terrible  despotism,  as  you  will; 
but  you  cannot  doubt  that  this  ideal  of  social 
sympathy  has  wrought  enormously  in  the  civ- 
ilisation of  the  present  day. 

In  part,  Rousseau's  influence  was  gained  by 
his  pure  literary  talent.  His  was  the  faculty  of 
creating  phrases  which  remain  in  the  memory 
after  all  the  inconsistencies  and  chimerical  fol- 
lies of  his  writings  have  been  forgotten,  and 
which  ring  like  trumpet  calls  to  action.  But 
beneath  it  all  lies  the  daemonic  personality  of 
the  writer,  the  inexplicable  force  that  imposed 
the  experience  of  this  man  Rousseau — vaga- 
bond as  he  was,  a  foe  of  convention,  betrayer 
of  sacred  trust,  morbid  self-analyst  ending  with 
fixed  hallucination  of  a  conspiracy  of  society 
against  him — the  magic  glamour  that  imposed 
the  private  emotions  of  this  man  upon  the  world. 
As  the  creed  of  Christianity  came  to  the  Middle 
Ages  coloured  by  the  intense  self-absorption  of 
St.  Augustine's  Confessions,  so  the  new  faith 
has  flamed  up  from  the  Confessions  of  Rousseau. 
The  Roman  had  set  an  example  for  the  pride  of 
the  saints;  our  modem  confessor  proclaimed  a 
similar  pride  for  all  the  weak  and  downtrodden. 
In  the  audacity  of  his  self-justification  as  of 
one  who  dares  say  I  am  that  I  am,  in  his  boast- 
ful  admission  that   it   was   always   impossible 


ROUSSEAU  237 

for  him  to  act  contrary  to  his  inclination,  in  his 
defiant  cry  against  a  Providence  that  caused 
him  to  be  born  among  men  yet  made  him  of  a 
different  species  from  them,  in  all  this  itching 
to  exhibit  himself,  he  was  the  father  of  roman- 
ticism and  of  a  morbid  individualism  that  seeks 
to  hide  itself  under  the  cloak  of  a  collective 
ideal. 

For  in  reality  his  double  motive  of  self-love 
and  sympathy  was  one  thing,  and  not  two. 
The  full  development  of  the  notion  of  sympa- 
thy will  be  found  in  Adam  Smith's  Theory  of 
Moral  Sentiments,  where  either  independently  or 
through  the  influence  of  Rousseau's  Discourse 
morality  is  based  systematically  on  that  sense. 
Both  the  Scot  and  the  Frenchman  would  per- 
haps admit  that,  to  a  certain  extent,  sympathy, 
as  the  faculty  of  putting  one's  self  in  the  place 
of  another,  is  a  phase  of  amour-propre,  in  so 
far  as  we  are  led  thereby  to  convert  the  pain 
of  others  into  fear  for  ourselves  and  the  joy  of 
others  into  hope  for  ourselves.  But  neither  of 
them  recognises  the  cognate  truth  that  when  the 
condition  of  others  is  conceived  in  a  causal  rela- 
tion to  ourselves  this  order  is  reversed.  That 
is  to  say,  if  the  pain  or  loss  of  another  in  any 
way  contributes  to  our  own  advantage,  we  rejoice 
in  it,  even  when  the  feeling  of  uneasiness  remains 
more  or  less  consciously  present;  and  contrari- 
wise with  the  joy  or  gain  of  another  which  effects 


238  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

our  own  disadvantage.  Thus  a  son  must  har- 
bour some  satisfaction  in  the  death  of  a  father 
whereby  he  comes  into  an  estate;  while  at  the 
same  time  he  may  feel  a  sorrow  derived  both 
from  the  severance  of  long  ties  and  from  the 
uneasy  foreboding  of  his  own  future  fate  as 
brought  home  to  him  by  the  present  example. 
It  is  because  of  this  ambiguous  character  of 
sympathy  that  it  can  never  take  the  place  of 
discipline  and  justice  in  regulating  the  affairs 
of  men;  as  it  is  at  best  an  extension  of  self-love, 
so  it  is  always,  when  interests  clash,  in  peril  of 
unmasking  as  downright  selfishness.  A  little 
honest  observation  of  the  actual  working  of 
Rousseauism  in  modern  society  would  confirm 
this  opinion  only  too  cruelly.  ^ 

It  will  have  been  remarked  that  one  leading 
idea  of  the  eighteenth  century  finds  no  place 

»The  place  of  egotism  and  sympathy  in  Rousseau's 
system  and  the  general  distinction  between  humanism 
and  humanitarianism  have  been  discussed  fully  and 
incisively  in  Irving  Babbitt's  Literature  and  the  Amer- 
ican College  (Boston:  Houghton,  Mifflin  &  Co.,  1908). 
I  take  pleasure  in  recording  my  large  indebtedness  to 
that  work. — Burke's  remark  is  well-known:  "We  have 
had  the  great  professor  and  founder  of  the  philos- 
ophy of  Vanity  in  England.  .  .  .  Benevolence  to  the 
whole  species,  and  want  of  feeling  for  every  individual 
with  whom  the  professors  come  in  contact,  form  the 
character  of  the  new  philosophy."  The  philosophy 
is  no  longer  new,  but  its  nature  has  not  altered  in  this 
respect. 


ROUSSEAU  239 

in  Rousseau's  system;  the  idea  of  progress  he 
even  repudiated.  Yet,  by  a  paradox,  the  believ- 
ers in  progress  have  found  in  him  weapons  ready- 
forged  to  their  hands ;  for  that  doctrine,  it  is  clear, 
derives  its  strength  from  a  trust  in  the  essential 
and  natural  rightness  of  human  instincts,  which 
need  only  freedom  to  develop  into  right  insti- 
tutions. In  practice,  however,  this  faith  in 
evolution  has  assumed  seemingly  diverse  forms 
as  it  has  attached  itself  to  the  principle  of  self- 
love  or  sympathy.  On  the  one  hand  we  have 
the  unabashed  acceptance  of  egotism  as  worked 
out  in  the  philosophy  of  Nietzsche,  and  as 
shown  in  the  unconscious  acts  of  the  dominant 
controllers  of  the  material  world.  Nietzsche's 
theory  is  beautifully  simple.  Society  as  he 
sees  it  now  existent  is  a  conspiracy  against  the 
individual.  The  religious  creeds,  with  their 
preaching  of  sympathy  and  renunciation,  the 
curbing  laws  of  the  State,  are  merely  an  organ- 
ised hypocrisy  by  which  the  few  strong  are  held 
in  subjection  to  the  many  weak.  In  time  the 
Will  to  Power  {der  Wille  zur  Mackt)  will  become 
conscious  and  assert  itself;  then  the  instincts 
of  the  strong  will  break  from  pusillanimous 
control,  and  we  shall  have  an  harmonious 
civiUsation  in  which  the  few,  following  their 
unhampered  desires,  will  rise  on  the  labours  of 
the  submissive  many,  as  now  man  makes  use  of 
a  beast  of  burden.     On  the  other  side  stands  the 


240  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

whole  group  of  theories  known  as  Socialism. 
To  Marx  and  his  followers  mankind  is  divided 
between  the  great  mass  of  workers  and  the  few 
capitalists  who  by  the  iron  law  of  wages  exploit 
them  ruthlessly.  Such  a  condition  is  the  result 
of  economic  evolution;  it  will  be  cured  when 
the  workers,  through  the  growth  of  class-con- 
sciousness, learn  their  sovereign  power,  and 
take  full  possession  of  the  sources  of  production 
and  wealth.  Competition  and  all  its  consequent 
suffering  will  thus  cease  when  the  people  are 
welded  into  a  unit  by  sympathy.  The  workers 
are  in  the  solidarity  of  their  interests  a  kind  of 
individual  oppressed  and  corrupted  by  the 
privileged  class  who  represent  the  traditional 
institutions  of  the  State. 

It  might  seem  fanciful  to  derive  systems  so 
contrary  in  tendency  from  the  same  origin,  yet 
both  are  alike  in  that  they  regard  the  evils  of 
civilisation  as  caused  by  that  dualism  of  the 
individual  and  society,  which  was  imposed  upon 
the  world  as  a  new  religion  by  one  who  sought 
in  this  way  to  escape  the  burden  of  personal 
responsibility.  Both  look  to  relief  in  the  solu- 
tion of  that  antinomy  through  the  application 
of  natural  science  to  human  affairs  and  through 
the  resulting  free  development  of  man's  natural 
instincts,  one  in  the  direction  of  egotism,  the 
other  of  sympathy.  Nor  is  this  difference  of 
direction  so  real  as  may  appear.     It  is  like  a 


ROUSSEAU  241 

bad  jest  to  suppose  that  under  the  Nietzschean 
regime,  when  the  liberated  superman  has  thrown 
off  all  sense  of  responsibility  and  self-control, 
the  masses  would  not  be  driven  by  unity  of 
interests  to  combine  for  retaliation.  To  many 
it  will  seem  an  equally  bad  jest  to  pretend  that 
a  social  sympathy  based  avowedly  on  class 
hatred  would  not,  if  relieved  from  the  con- 
straint of  that  opposition,  fly  into  an  anarchy 
of  egotisms.  One  wonders  curiously,  or  sadly 
sometimes,  that  the  preachers  who  abdicate 
the  fear  of  God  for  humanitarianism,  and  the 
teachers  who  surrender  the  higher  discipline 
for  subservience  to  individual  choice,  do  not 
see,  or,  seeing,  do  not  dread,  the  goal  toward 
which  they  are  facing. 
16 


SOCRATES  1 

In  the  end  the  one  importunate  question  re- 
mains :  How  do  we  ourselves  stand  in  regard  to 
these  revolutions  of  faith?    Religious  creeds,  like 
other  human  things,  come  and  go;  they  have 
their  periods  of  growth,  of  waning,  of  momen- 
tary rehabilitation,  and  then  their  reluctant  dis- 
appearance.     It   is  not  rash  to   say   that   the 
creed  so  long  cherished   by  the  western  world 
has   followed   this   inevitable   course,  and   that 
the  Church  even  now  retains  but  a  shadow  of 
its  former  authority.     Only  a  bookish  dreamer 
will  hug   the   delusion  of   supposing    that   the 
effort   of    modem  German    theology    to    treat 
Christianity  as  a  beautiful  emotion  deprived  of 
exact  dogma  can  have  any  prevalence  among  the 
people  at  large ;  as  a  branch  of  romantic  idealism 
it  is  doomed  to  evaporate  in  misty  words.      A 
reverent  mind,  touched  with  the  pathos  of  the 
past,  will  not  speak  lightly  of  this  dying  insti- 
tution.     He  has  seen  the  glory  of  its  age, — the 
comfort  it  has  bestowed  upon  many  troubled 

>  Copyright  1898  by  Houghton,  Mifflin  &  Company, 
all  rights  reserved. 

242 


SOCRATES  243 

hearts,  the  strength  it  has  imparted  to  the  weak, 
the  terror  it  has  imposed  upon  the  vicious;  he 
has  felt  the  exaltation  of  its  imaginative  sym- 
bolism, he  knows  how  much  of  purest  faith  has 
been  nourished  by  its  doctrine,  he  has  perhaps 
looked  regretfully  with  Matthew  Arnold  and 
Clough  and  those  other  unwilling  doubters  at 
the  ebbing  of  the  tide: 

But  now  I  only  hear 

Its  melancholy,  long,  withdrawing  roar, 

Retreating,  to  the  breath 

Of  the  night-wind,  down  the  vast  edges  drear 

And  naked  shingles  of  the  world. 

All  this  he  knows,  but  he  knows,  too,  that  we 
cannot  hold  confidently  to  the  belief  in  a  personal 
God  as  anything  more  than  a  projection  of 
man's  own  soul  into  the  void.  The  sting  of 
that  personification  was  drawn  with  the  defeat 
of  Augustine's  doctrine  of  infinite  righteousness 
set  over  against  finite  sinfulness;  Pelagianism 
sank  into  deism,  and  deism,  having  no  root  in 
the  reality  of  evil  and  the  conscious  dualism 
of  the  heart,  has  become  more  and  more  a  toy 
of  the  poets  and  a  bubble  of  the  metaphy- 
sicians. 

That  sense  of  dualism,  and  with  it  the  driving 
force  of  religion,  passed  into  Rousseau's  contrast 
of  the  natural  man  and  society.  Humani- 
tarianism  also  has  had  its  consolations  and 
restraining  powers,  and  possibly  its   portion  of 


244  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

good  may  abide  with  us  when  its  false  assump- 
tions have  been  exploded.  But  already  we  are 
beginning  to  see  that  its  externalising  of  evil 
from  the  individual  contains  threats  of  social 
disintegration  more  alarming  than  the  Christian 
deification  of  righteousness,  and  that  its  shirking 
of  responsibility  is  a  more  insidious  danger  than 
Augustine's  blank  repression  of  human  nature. 
A  prudent  man  will  not  prophesy.  He  may 
feel  safe  in  predicting  that  humanitarianism 
will  accomplish  its  measure  of  benefit  and  in- 
jury, and  then  pass  away — rapidly,  he  will 
think,  by  reason  of  its  flagrant  falsehood  and 
inadequacy;  but  what  will  take  its  place? 
Some  new  expression,  no  doubt,  of  that  inherent 
sense  of  self-division  which  man  can  satisfy  only 
by  the  delusion  of  ever-changing  myths  and 
philosophies;  but  what  its  form  shall  be,  the 
years  alone  can  reveal. 

It  is  true  that  little  comfort  is  gained  from 
reading  the  record  of  man's  life  at  large.  Now, 
as  always,  the  demand  of  religion  is  the  old  law  of 
Aristotle,  "so  far  as  may  be  to  put  on  immor- 
tality" (oo-ov  cvSe'xeTai  a^avart'^civ) ,  tO  turn 
from  considering  what  is  ephemeral  in  our  na- 
ture to  what  is  eternal;  and  in  its  deeper  as- 
pect the  lesson  of  history  is  nothing  else  but 
the  recurring  effort  of  society,  through  strange 
paths  and  blind  gropings,  to  realise  this  law. 
Yet  still,  after  these  thousands  of    years,  the 


SOCRATES  245 

form  of  social  religion  shifts  from  one  fantastic 
myth  or  philosophy  to  another,  while  the  in- 
dividual men  live,  as  they  have  always  lived, 
absorbed  for  the  most  part  in  the  interests  of 
the  hour.  It  might  be  the  counsel  of  wisdom 
to  accept  the  situation  and  seek  for  happiness, 
where  the  world  says  it  can  be  found,  in  the 
common  activities  of  the  people,  in  the  striving 
for  daily  success  and  the  satisfaction  of  duties 
fulfilled,  in  the  triumphs  over  natural  forces; 
silencing  the  heart  with  the  assertion  that  the 
counter  instinct  of  mankind,  which  revolts  from 
religion  as  from  a  principle  destructive  of  normal 
life,  is  both  necessary  and  wholesome.  It 
might  be  wisdom,  but  to  one  in  whom  faith  has 
dawned,  it  is  simply  not  possible.  He  has  seen 
the  treachery  that  hides  under  the  smiling  face 
of  the  world's  peace;  he  knows  the  tcsdium  vitcz 
that  like  a  sullen  master  drives  the  world  in  its 
unresting,  headlong  course;  he  has  caught 
glimpses  of  the  frenzy  of  disillusion  that  threatens 
to  devastate  the  world's  heart  at  the  first  mo- 
ment of  repose.  Yes,  to  one  whose  eye  has 
opened,  though  it  be  for  a  moment  only,  upon 
the  vision  of  an  indefectible  peace,  there  is  hence- 
forth no  compulsion  that  can  make  him  rest 
satisfied  in  passing  pleasures;  the  end  of  desire 
has  devoured  its  beginning,  and  he  is  driven 
by  a  power  greater  than  the  hope  of  any  reward 
"to  fast  from  this  earth."     He  may,  indeed  he 


246  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

must,   pursue   ephemeral   things,   but  he   shall 
not  know  his  content  in  them. 

In  his  feeling  of  isolation  such  an  one  cannot 
seek  courage  in  the  evolution  of  religion,  for  here 
there  is  the  same  bafBing  apparition  of  change 
and  decay.  His  consolation  is  in  a  humbler 
view.  Contracting  his  gaze  from  the  wide 
fluctuations  of  time,  let  him  look  steadfastly 
upon  the  few  great  spirits  who  have  climbed  to 
their  own  refuge  of  faith,  whose  example  is 
fixed  in  the  past  where  no  alteration  can  reach, 
whose  voices,  if  he  listen,  will  speak  to  him 
with  a  power  of  conviction  which  no  confusion 
of  popular  tongues  shall  overwhelm  or  distort. 
He  might  go  to  the  sages  of  India,  to  Yajnaval- 
kya  or  another  of  those  forest  philosophers, 
but  their  forms  are  too  shadowy,  and  there  is 
in  their  doctrine  I  know  not  what  of  austere 
and  remote  which  repels  the  pupil  of  the  western 
world.  And  after  all,  though  they  could  see 
the  irrational  bond  between  works  and  faith, 
yet  their  failure  to  admit  any  compromise 
with  the  sphere  of  desires  hardened  religion 
finally  into  a  rigid  impossibility.  He  might 
turn  rather  to  the  real  Jesus,  but  here  again  the 
image  of  the  Saviour  is  involved  completely 
in  the  historic  error  of  Christianity — if  there 
is  not  in  that  feminine  gospel  of  love  for  God 
and  man,  even  in  its  original  purity,  an  inherent 
illusion  which  cannot  be  severed  from  its  body 


SOCRATES  247 

of  truth.  I  can  speak  only  of  what  I  know, 
and  for  me,  as  one  deceptive  hope  after  another 
has  fallen  away,  I  go  back  to  the  life  of  Socrates 
and  the  reasoning  of  Plato  and  am  never  de- 
ceived. I  am  assured  that  they  were  seeking 
what  I  seek,  and  that  they  attained  what  hardly 
and  with  their  borrowed  strength  I  may  at 
last  attain. 

Fortunately,  though  few  of  the  events  of 
Socrates'  life  are  known,  yet  thanks  to  the 
literary  skill  of  two  of  his  disciples  we  are  per- 
haps better  acquainted  with  his  appearance  and 
character  and  general  habits  than  with  those  of 
any  other  man  of  ancient  Greece.  We  feel  a  cer- 
tain intimacy  with  him  as  with  Boswell's  Dr. 
Johnson.  There  are  innumerable  references  to 
Socrates  in  later  classical  writers,  but  our  trust- 
worthy information  regarding  him  is  pretty 
well  confined  to  the  works  of  his  two  followers, 
Xenophon  and  Plato.  The  former,  besides 
several  minor  works  devoted  to  the  master,  has 
left  us  four  books  of  Memoirs,  written  with  the 
ostensible  purpose  of  defending  his  memory 
against  the  calumnious  charges  that  caused  his 
death.  Now  Xenophon  was  a  most  amiable 
gentleman  and  an  admirable  writer,  but  with 
the  least  possible  tincture  of  philosophy  or 
moral  enthusiasm  in  his  soul;  and  it  is  generally 
admitted  that  his  Memoirs   of   Socrates,  while 


248  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

presenting  a  faithful  picture  of  the  master's 
daily  life,  quite  fail  to  grasp  its  higher  and  more 
universal  meaning.  The  Socrates  of  Xenophon 
could  never  have  produced  such  a  permanent 
revolution  in  thought  as  is  connected  with  the 
great  Athenian's  name.  But  by  favour  of 
the  generous  fate  that  seemed  to  rule  over 
Greek  letters,  Socrates,  the  greatest  man  of 
antiquity,  had  as  disciple  the  wisest  philosopher 
and  the  most  consummate  master  of  prose 
writing  the  ancient — and  we  might  add  the 
modern — world  has  known.  The  Socrates  who 
is  still  the  inspiration  of  the  best  and  noblest 
thought  of  to-day  is  not  the  simple  Socrates 
who  died  in  the  jail  of  Athens,  but  a  very  com- 
plicated character  that  has  passed  through  the 
alembic  of  Plato's  brain;  so  that  to  us  "So- 
cratic"  and  "  Platonic"  mean  generally  the  same 
thing,  and  it  is  a  task  of  the  utmost  delicacy  to 
separate  the  original  teacher  from  the  creation 
of  the  disciple's  fancy.  Yet  Plato  was  far  from 
traducing  the  doctrine  of  his  master;  his  service 
was  rather  to  expand  and  develop.  And  if 
sometimes  in  the  wide-sweeping  logic  and  gorge- 
ous symbolism  of  the  younger  philosopher  the 
simplicity  of  the  older  seems  quite  obscured  or 
even  travestied,  yet  a  little  closer  attention  will 
discover  the  old  Socratic  teaching  unchanged. 
The  philosophy  of  ideas,  and  reminiscence,  and 
all  that  we  deem  most  distinctly  Platonic,  is  but 


SOCRATES  249 

a  development  and  not  a  negation  of  the  lesson 
learned  from  Socrates*  self-knowledge.  As  re- 
gards the  master's  personal  appearance  and 
manner  of  life,  however,  there  is  no  such  problem 
to  give  us  pause.  In  these  matters  Plato  and 
Xenophon  agree  so  perfectly  that  we  cannot 
doubt  the  veracity  of  the  portraiture. 

In  the  deme  of  Alopece,  lying  just  outside  of 
Athens  between  Mount  Lycabettus  and  the 
Ilissus,  Socrates  was  born  in  the  year  469  B.C. 
His  father  Sophroniscus  was  a  sculptor,  and 
there  is  a  persistent  tradition  that  the  son  in 
after  years  followed  the  same  profession.  He 
is  said  even  to  have  won  considerable  repute  as  a 
maker  of  statues ;  and  in  the  time  of  the  traveller 
Pausanias  two  Charites  standing  at  the  entrance 
to  the  Acropolis  were  pointed  out  as  his  handi- 
work. But  the  later  life  of  the  philosopher 
might  seem  to  corroborate  the  story  that  he 
quite  despised  and  neglected  the  workshop, 
though  we  need  not  suppose  that,  as  the  story 
further  adds,  he  gave  himself  up  to  idle  courses. 
His  mother  Phasnerete,  for  whom  Socrates 
seems  to  have  entertained  great  respect,  was  a 
midwife;  and,  if  we  may  believe  Plato,  the 
philosopher  was  fond  of  alluding  to  the  fact  and 
declaring  that  he  inherited  the  profession,  his 
office  being  to  assist  young  men  in  bringing 
to  the  light  the  generous  thoughts  that  lay 
dormant  within  them. 


250  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

The  writers  of  antiquity  were  zealous  collect- 
ors of  anecdotes  and  witty  sayings;  their  mem- 
ory for  these  was  inexhaustible,  and  in  general 
we  may  accept  with  some  confidence  the  shrewd 
words  they  report  of  their  great  men.  But  on 
the  other  hand,  they  were  less  careful  about  the 
events  of  a  man's  life,  and  were  ready  in  this 
respect  to  credit  the  wildest  rumours  and  myths. 
In  especial  the  childhood  and  death  of  famous 
men  were  soon  enveloped  in  a  halo  of  legends, 
and  Socrates  naturally  was  not  exempt  from 
this  canonisation.  So,  for  instance,  Plutarch  tells 
us  how  at  the  child's  birth  his  father  inquired 
of  the  Delphian  oracle  about  his  rearing,  and 
was  admonished  in  reply  "to  suffer  the  lad  to 
do  whatever  entered  his  mind,  and  to  use  no 
coercion.  Neither  should  he  attempt  to  divert 
the  boy  from  his  native  impulses  but  should 
offer  prayers  in  his  behalf  to  Zeus  Agorasus 
and  the  Muses,  and  have  no  further  concern, 
for  Socrates  had  in  his  own  breast  a  surer  guide 
than  any  number  of  masters  and  pedagogues." 
Plutarch  in  his  reverence  has  repeated  an  idle 
legend  which  grew  out  of  Socrates'  daemon,  or 
inner  guide,  and  his  connection  with  the  oracle 
later  in  life. 

It  was  also  very  common  in  antiquity  to 
indicate  the  intellectual  relationship  of  noted 
men  by  associating  them  as  teacher  and  pupil, 
often  in  despite  of  the  most  incongruous  an- 


SOCRATES  251 

achronism.  So,  if  we  could  believe  later  stories, 
Socrates  was  the  pupil  of  a  great  many  famous 
philosophers,  musicians,  rhetoricians,  and  men 
of  science,  some  of  whom  he  could  never  have 
seen.  In  the  Apology  Socrates  says  that  he 
received  the  regular  education  appointed  by  the 
Athenian  laws,  and  this  we  may  accept  as 
authentic.  With  the  other  boys  of  his  age  he 
went  to  teachers  who  instructed  him  in  music 
and  gymnastics, — a  very  simple  education, 
although  the  term  "music"  included  a  pretty 
thorough  study  of  the  poets. 

But  doubtless  the  young  man's  real  education 
was  what  he  himself  picked  up  in  his  intercourse 
with  the  citizens  of  Athens  and  with  the  in- 
numerable strangers  who  flocked  thither.  At 
that  time  Athens  was  at  the  height  of  her 
military  glory,  and  had  become  the  intellectual 
centre  of  Hellas,  "the  eye  of  Greece,  mother 
of  arts  and  eloquence,"  as  Milton  calls  her. 
All  the  currents  of  thought  of  that  eager  question- 
ing world  met  there,  and  already  the  Athenians 
showed  that  curiosity  which  in  their  decay 
led  St.  Luke  to  say  of  them  that  they  "spend 
their  time  in  nothing  else  but  either  to  tell  or 
to  hear  some  new  thing."  We  have  trustworthy 
evidence  that  the  young  Socrates  talked  with 
Parmenides,  when  the  aged  philosopher  of  Elea 
was  visiting  Athens;  he  met  and  argued  with 
Protagoras,  the  renowned  sophist,  and  we  may 


252  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

be  sure  he  let  no  famous  stranger  pass  through 
the  city  without  seeking  to  discover  what  secret 
wisdom  the  newcomer  might  possess.  For  this 
search  after  wisdom  was  Socrates'  mission  in 
life,  and  in  his  earlier  years  no  doubt  he  ap- 
proached each  new  man  renowned  in  the  Greek 
world  for  wisdom  with  modesty  and  with  a 
hungering  desire  to  learn.  But  as  man  after 
man  disappointed  him,  as  he  found  empty 
pretence  taking  the  place  of  real  knowledge, 
and  the  idle  use  of  words  passing  for  true  under- 
standing, and  shallow  cleverness  claiming  the 
praise  of  genuine  insight,  gradually  the  attitude 
and  manner  of  this  strange  inquisitor  took  on 
a  change.  Instead  of  seeking  for  wisdom  in 
others,  he  began  systematically  and  imperturb- 
ably  to  expose  their  folly,  teaching  them  that 
the  understanding  of  their  own  ignorance  was 
the  first  step  toward  the  knowledge  whose 
possession  they  already  vaunted  so  loudly. 

This  change  in  Socrates'  manner  took  place 
apparently  when  he  was  about  thirty  years 
old, — the  age  at  which  great  reformers  are  wont, 
it  seems,  to  begin  their  labours, — and  from  that 
time  to  his  death  he  must  have  been  one  of  the 
marked  characters  in  that  city  of  notable  men. 
This  terrible  debater  of  the  market-place,  this 
"^sop  of  the  mob,"  as  Emerson  calls  him, 
with  his  great  bald  head  and  monstrous  face, 
barefooted,  and  wearing  but  one  robe,  the  same 


SOCRATES  253 

in  summer  and  winter,  was  the  strangest  and 
most  invincible  talker  the  world  ever  has  known, 
the  more  formidable  because  his  insatiable 
curiosity  led  the  unwary  into  making  rash 
statements,  while  his  unabashed  assumption 
of  ignorance  gave  no  opportunity  for  retort. 
Ignorant  false  pretenders  to  wisdom  he  bullied 
and  mauled  outrageously;  the  honest  he  left 
oftenest  with  a  doubt  still  unsettled,  but  always 
a  doubt  that  pointed  the  way  to  a  higher  truth ; 
the  young,  with  whom  he  especially  loved  to 
converse,  he  treated  with  a  kind  of  fatherly 
tenderness,  often  very  quaint  and  genial. 

Xenophon's  Memoirs  are  a  collection  of  brief 
conversations  between  Socrates  and  various 
persons  of  the  city,  and  give  us  an  admirably 
clear  picture  of  the  man.  "He  was  always  in 
public  view,"  writes  Xenophon;  "in  the  morning 
he  went  to  the  arcades  and  gymnasiums,  when 
the  market-place  filled  he  was  to  be  seen  there, 
and  the  rest  of  the  day  you  might  find  him 
wherever  the  most  people  were  congregated." 
At  one  time  we  hear  him  talking  with  Aristo- 
demus,  "the  little,"  pointing  out  to  this  great 
scoffer  of  the  gods  the  beauty  and  design  of  the 
world,  and  proving  thereby  the  intelligence 
of  the  divine  government;  at  another  time  we 
hear  him  debating  with  the  shrewd  Aristippus, 
who  was  afterwards  to  be  the  author  of  the 
philosophy   of   pleasure   and   laissez-faire,    per- 


2  54  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

suading  that  skeptic  to  sacrifice  his  ease  and 
enter  public  Hfe;  we  hear  him  encouraging  the 
younger  Pericles,  son  of  the  famous  statesman, 
to  attempt  the  restoration  of  Athens  to  her 
fonner  glory  and  power;  we  see  his  cunning 
management  of  Glauco,  a  mere  boy,  whom  none 
of  his  friends  could  restrain  from  speaking  be- 
fore the  people,  although  he  won  only  laughter 
and  had  even  been  disgracefully  dragged  from 
the  bema.  This  odd  genius,  whom  the  young 
men  followed  in  crowds,  was  fond  of  discoursing 
about  friendship;  he  prided  himself  on  his  skill 
in  bringing  together  men  who  would  be  of 
mutual  help  to  each  other,  and  more  than  one 
of  his  reported  conversations  turns  on  this 
question.  He  was  a  persistent  advocate  of 
submission  to  the  laws  and  of  obedience  to 
authority;  and  we  have  a  curious  dialogue  be- 
tween him  and  his  son  Lamprocles,  who,  ap- 
parently with  some  reason,  revolted  against  the 
intolerable  temper  of  Xanthippe,  more  intoler- 
able than  that  of  a  wild  beast,  as  the  son  de- 
clared. At  another  time  Socrates  visits  the 
studio  of  Parrhasius,  who  by  the  testimony  of 
Pliny  first  developed  the  art  of  composition  in 
painting  and  gave  animation  to  the  countenance ; 
and  it  is  curious  to  find  Socrates  talking  with 
him  on  this  very  subject,  convincing  him  that 
the  qualities  of  the  soul  as  well  as  mere  physical 
beauty  can  be  portrayed  in  forms  and  colours. 


SOCRATES  255 

No  doubt  the  adversaries  of  Socrates  often 
tried  to  retaliate  on  him  and  bring  him  to  con- 
fusion, but  they  reckoned  without  their  man. 
Hippias,  the  famous  master  of  rhetoric,  most 
eloquent  and  learned,  who  is  ready  to  answer 
any  man's  question,  who  will  talk  to  you  on 
astronomy,  geometry,  arithmetic,  language, 
rhythms,  melodies,  genealogies,  antiquities,  vir- 
tue, who  boasts  that  he  can  make  his  own  clothes 
and  shoes,  a  universal  genius  and  a  florid  orator 
withal, — this  fine  sophist  exclaims  in  disgust, 
"Really,  Socrates,  you  are  saying  the  same 
things  I  have  heard  from  you  over  and  over 
again!"  "And  what  is  worse,"  replies  Socrates, 
"I  am  not  only  forever  repeating  the  same 
words,  but  always  about  the  same  subjects 
too;  but  your  learning  is  so  manifold,  that 
doubtless  you  never  say  the  same  thing  twice 
about  the  same  matter." 

Socrates'  connection  with  women  is  not  the 
least  interesting  phase  of  his  life.  A  good  deal 
of  mystery  hangs  about  his  marriage.  It  is 
known  that  he  was  married  twice,  to  the  ill- 
famed  Xanthippe  and  to  Myrto;  but  which 
was  his  first  wife  cannot  easily  be  decided;  and 
indeed  there  were  in  later  times  idle  rumours 
that  he  was  the  husband  of  both  at  the  same 
time.  The  bad  temper  of  Xanthippe  was 
proverbial  in  antiquity.  The  stories  told  about 
her  were  often  as  absurd  as  they  were  enter- 


256  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

taining.  Socrates  standing  in  a  reverie,  his 
wife  scolding  and  finally  throwing  a  pail  of 
dirty  water  over  him,  and  the  philosopher's 
exasperating  retort,  "It  generally  rains  after 
thunder," — is  one  of  the  best  known  of  these 
scandalous  anecdotes.  Perhaps  the  story  re- 
lated by  Xenophon  in  the  Convivium  may  be  ac- 
cepted with  more  credence.  Socrates  there  gives 
a  humorous  reason  for  marrying  Xanthippe: 
"I  see,"  said  he,  "that  those  who  wish  to  become 
skilful  horsemen  get  the  most  spirited  horses 
rather  than  the  gentlest;  for  they  suppose  that 
if  they  can  bridle  these,  they  will  be  able  to 
deal  with  any  horse.  So  I,  wishing  to  mingle 
among  men  and  deal  with  them,  have  taken 
this  woman,  knowing  well  that  if  I  can  endure 
her,  I  can  easily  get  along  with  any  man  at  all." 
Several  times  Socrates  is  reported  as  mention- 
ing Aspasia,  and  we  may  well  believe  that  he 
took  pleasure  in  talking  with  this  woman,  who, 
besides  her  personal  charms,  was  clear-headed 
enough  to  advise  Pericles  in  statesmanship. 
In  one  place  he  alludes  to  her  as  wise  in  house- 
hold affairs,  and  in  another  as  having  instructed 
him  in  the  art  of  joining  together  friends. 
There  is,  too,  in  the  Memoirs,  an  interesting 
chapter  relating  to  one  Theodote,  a  woman 
famous  in  Athens  for  her  inexpressible  beauty, 
and  much  sought  after  by  artists  as  a  model. 
Socrates,  one  day,  is  carried  by  an  acquaintance 


SOCRATES  257 

to  a  studio  where  she  is  posing,  and,  as  always, 
the  philosopher  starts  a  discussion:  "Friends," 
said  he,  "ought  we  rather  to  be  thankful  to 
Theodote  for  permitting  us  this  vision  of  her 
beauty,  or  she  to  us  because  we  look  at  her?" 
It  must  have  been  a  rare  treat  to  hear  this 
humorous  inquisitor  discussing  such  a  question 
with  the  fairest  woman  of  Athens.  Theodote, 
like  every  one  else,  we  are  told,  was  charmed 
by  his  words,  and  begged  for  his  friendship: 
"Come  to  me  when  you  wish,"  replies  the  non- 
chalant sage;  "I  will  receive  you,  if  there  is  no 
dearer  friend  within." 

The  strangest,  most  enigmatical  woman 
with  whom  Socrates'  name  is  associated  is  a 
certain  Diotima,  a  wise  prophetess  of  Man- 
tineia,  who  is  said  to  have  deferred  the  plague 
at  Athens  ten  years  by  a  sacrifice.  In  the 
Symposium  of  Plato  the  guests  one  after  another 
pronounce  an  encomium  on  Love;  but  when  it 
comes  Socrates'  turn,  he  as  usual  declares  his 
complete  ignorance  of  the  matter,  and  can  only 
repeat  what  he  once  heard  from  this  learned 
Diotima.  The  dialogue  which  he  then  relates 
as  having  occurred  between  him  and  the 
Mantineian  prophetess  develops  at  length  the 
peculiar  theory  of  love  which  to  this  day  is  called 
Platonic,  and  which  is  so  beautifully  treated  by 
Emerson  in  his  essay  on  that  subject.  The 
conversation,  no  doubt,  is  a  pure  invention  of 
17 


258  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Plato's;  yet  the  elements  of  the  Platonic  love 
are  seen  clearly  in  Socrates'  actual  relationship 
with  men  and  women,  and  this  half-mystic 
passion  has  had  much  to  do  with  raising  the 
doctrine  and  example  of  Socrates  from  the 
region  of  mere  philosophy  into  that  of  a  religion, 
one  might  say,  which  has  broadened  and  deep- 
ened the  spiritual  life  of  the  world.  But  the  words 
of  Diotima  have  further  interest  in  throwing 
light  on  an  ambiguous  phase  of  Socrates'  inner 
life.  Love,  she  says,  is  neither  mortal  nor 
immortal,  but  something  intermediate  between 
the  two,  a  great  spirit  or  dcBmon.  Now  it  is 
well  known  that  Socrates  believed  he  was  guided 
all  through  life  by  some  inner  voice,  some  pe- 
culiar daemonic  influence;  and  from  that  day 
to  this  men  have  not  ceased  trying  to  explain 
the  nature  of  this  mystery.  In  the  earliest 
Greek,  in  Homer  first  of  all,  the  daemons  or 
daemonic  powers  are  scarcely  distinguishable 
from  the  gods,  and  indeed  there  and  very  com- 
monly in  later  authors  the  two  terms  are  inter- 
changeable. But  from  the  beginning  there 
was  a  tendency  to  speak  of  the  daemonic  powers 
more  vaguely,  to  personify  them  less  clearly 
than  the  gods.  Apart  from  the  pantheon  of 
deities  who  were  worshipped  under  special 
names  and  with  more  or  less  clearly  defined 
cults,  the  Greeks  felt  in  the  world  about  them 
the  influence  of  more  obscure  agencies,  which 


SOCRATES  259 

in  the  course  of  time  became  distinguished 
from  the  divine  as  daemonic.  So  a  man  whose 
actions  appeared  unaccountable  was  said  to  be 
under  daemonic  influence  or  possession.  And 
as  such  lack  of  self-government  was  deprecated 
by  the  Greeks,  these  daemonic  powers  in  the 
end  came  to  have  a  sinister  character,  and  by 
the  Christians  were  regarded  as  equivalent  to 
devils;  and  in  this  sense  the  word  lingers  in 
modem  languages.  But  this  sinister  meaning, 
though  perhaps  lurking  in  the  word  from  remote 
antiquity,  was  very  far  from  universal  in  the 
times  of  Socrates  and  Plato.  The  daemonic 
powers  were  to  Plato  intermediate  between  the 
gods  and  men;  from  the  former  they  brought 
down  to  man  the  blessings  of  heaven,  and  from 
man  they  carried  petitions  and  prayers  of 
thanksgiving  to  the  gods.  They  were  the 
medium  by  which  the  divine  part  of  man,  locked 
in  its  earthly  prison,  communicated  with  the 
outer  spiritual  world;  and  in  some  such  sense 
as  this  is  to  be  understood  the  daemon  of 
Socrates. 

This  guide,  which  came  to  him  in  his  early 
youth,  manifested  itself  by  dreams  and  visions 
and  as  it  were  by  an  inner  voice.  If  we  may 
credit  Xenophon,  it  admonished  him  to  do 
this  and  to  forego  that,  but  according  to  the 
more  precise  and  probably  truer  account  of 
Plato,  it  came  only  as  a  negative  warning  against 


26o  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

wrong-doing  and  misfortune.  It  was  nothing 
akin  to  what  would  have  been  called  in  the 
Middle  Ages  a  familiar  or  a  guardian  angel,  for 
it  came  to  Socrates  without  distinct  personality. 
It  was  not  hallucination,  for  the  paradox  is 
beyond  credence  which  would  find  such  signs 
of  disorganisation  in  one  pre-eminent  above  all 
for  sanity  of  mind  and  body.  It  was  not  con- 
science, as  some  have  interpreted,  for  it  was 
prophetic  rather  than  retrospective,  and  con- 
tained nothing  of  the  character  of  remorse. 
It  might  rather  be  likened  to  the  half-heard 
voice  of  warning  and  inspiration,  the  bath-kol,  or 
daughter  of  a  voice,  as  Maimonides  quaintly 
calls  it,  which  came  as  a  guide  to  the  prophets 
of  old. 

There  is  a  passage  in  the  Memoirs  which  may 
throw  some  light  on  this  obscure  subject.  Soc- 
rates is  talking  with  Euthydemus  and  expatiat- 
ing on  the  kindness  of  the  gods,  who  have  given 
us  faculties  of  perception,  and  above  these 
reason  to  guide  us,  and,  where  reason  fails,  the 
oracles  to  warn  us  of  the  future.  "'To  you, 
Socrates,'  says  Euthydemus,  '  the  gods  seem  to 
be  even  more  friendly  than  to  other  men;  you 
need  not  ask  them,  yet  they  point  out  to  you 
what  to  do  and  what  not.'  'And  that  they  are 
ready  to  favour  all  men  in  this  way,'  replies 
Socrates,  '  you  yourself  will  know,  if  you  do  not 
wait  to  behold  the  visible  forms  of  the  deities, 


SOCRATES  261 

but  are  content  seeing  their  works  to  worship 
these,  and  thus  do  honour  to  thp  gods  them- 
selves.' "  Socrates  would  seem  to  say  that  this 
revelation,  so  peculiar  to  himself,  was  yet  open  to 
all  men  who  like  him  could  live  in  perfect  har- 
mony with  the  world  and  in  blameless  faith.  As 
the  birds  and  beasts  of  the  forest  by  some  subtle 
sympathy  foretell  the  changes  of  weather  and 
the  revolution  of  the  seasons,  and  as  men  whose 
lives  are  passed  in  contact  with  nature  acquire 
marvellous  faculties  of  perception,  so  also  Soc- 
rates, by  the  perfect  balance  of  his  powers  and 
by  the  inner  harmony  of  his  life,  would  seem 
in  some  extraordinary  way  to  have  been  in 
sympathy  with  the  laws  of  the  moral  world. 
This  bond  of  sympathy  was  very  properly  lik- 
ened to  those  mediating  daemonic  agencies 
whose  description  Plato  puts  in  the  mouth  of 
the  prophetess  Diotima,  and  among  whom  was 
Love,  for  the  Platonic  love  is  very  close  to 
that  sympathy  which  grows  ever  deeper  and 
wider  with  widening  knowledge. 

Besides  the  daemonic  signs  Socrates  had,  as 
he  thought,  a  direct  command  from  the  gods  to 
prosecute  his  mission  of  inquiry.  The  story 
of  the  oracular  response,  proclaiming  Socrates 
the  wisest  of  men,  and  of  its  influence  on  his 
life,  is  related  in  the  Apology,  and  need  not  be 
repeated  here.  He  himself  connected  this 
Delphic  utterance  with  the  famous  command, 


262  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Know  thyself,  which  was  inscribed,  as  it  were 
a  salutation  of  the  god,  over  the  entrance  to  the 
shrine  at  Delphi ;  and  although  with  his  custom- 
ary irony  he  would  turn  this  understanding  of 
himself  into  a  confession  of  ignorance,  yet  in 
truth  his  peculiar  interpretation  of  the  ancient 
saying  was  the  keynote  to  all  that  he  taught, 
positive  as  well  as  negative,  and  from  it  his 
mission  received  what  he  recognised  as  a  divine 
sanction. 

So  it  was  that  to  accomplish  his  end  he  felt 
justified  in  surrendering  all  that  the  world 
usually  holds  precious,  and  in  avoiding  what  to 
most  men  seemed  then  the  first  duties  of  a 
citizen.  He  was  sent  to  rouse  the  Athenians 
to  a  higher  life,  and  to  Athens  he  clung  more 
persistently  than  the  very  maimed  and  halt. 
Scarcely  was  he  to  be  found  outside  of  the  city 
walls,  for,  as  he  said,  he  was  a  lover  of  knowledge 
and  he  could  learn  from  the  men  of  the  city, 
but  not  from  fields  and  trees.  And  as  for 
travelling,  he  had  never  except  once  gone  a 
pleasure  journey.  His  private  affairs  were  so 
neglected  that  his  poverty  was  notorious;  and 
he  even  refrained  from  public  business,  fearing 
lest  he  should  lose  life  prematurely  in  the  tur- 
moil of  the  times.  It  was  an  old  saying  in 
Greece  that  it  was  better  to  take  sides  with 
even  the  worst  faction  than  with  no  party  at 
all ;  and  how  shall  we  excuse  Socrates  for  stand- 


SOCRATES  263 

ing  apart  when  the  voice  and  arm  of  every  good 
man  was  needed  to  save  the  constitution,  nay, 
even  the  very  existence  of  the  State?  We  can 
only  take  him  at  his  word.  He  felt  no  power 
within  him  to  govern;  he  believed  he  had  a 
great  work  to  fulfil  with  individual  men,  and 
so  deliberately  kept  aloof  from  public  affairs, 
knowing  he  was  too  honest  a  man  to  enter  that 
arena  and  save  his  life;  and  the  reckless  execu- 
tions in  Athens  fully  justified  his  precaution. 
Yet  when  political  duties  devolved  on  him 
unsought,  he  never  shirked,  and  courageously 
opposed  both  the  fury  of  the  people  and  the 
despotism  of  the  Thirty.  As  a  soldier  he  served 
through  two  campaigns,  and  on  both  occasions 
gave  signal  proof  of  his  fortitude  and  bravery. 
In  the  Symposium  of  Plato  we  have  a  most 
graphic  picture  of  him  as  a  soldier,  given  by  his 
young  admirer  Alcibiades,  and  it  may  be  well 
to  quote  Shelley's  translation  of  this  famous 
passage : 

At  one  time  we  were  fellow-soldiers,  and  had  our 
mess  together  in  the  camp  before  Potidasa.  Socrates 
there  overcame  not  only  me,  but  every  one  beside,  in 
endurance  of  toils:  when,  as  often  happens  in  a  cam- 
paign, "we  were  reduced  to  few  provisions,  there  were 
none  who  could  sustain  hunger  like  Socrates;  and  when 
we  had  plenty,  he  alone  seemed  to  enjoy  our  military 
fare.  He  never  drank  much  willingly,  but  when  he 
was  compelled,  he  conquered  all  even  in  that  to  which 
he  was  least  accustomed;  and  what  is  most  astonish- 


264  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

ing,  no  person  ever  saw  Socrates  drunk  either  then 
or  at  any  other  time.  In  the  depth  of  winter  (and 
the  winters  there  are  excessively  rigid),  he  sustained 
calmly  incredible  hardships:  and  amongst  other  things, 
whilst  the  frost  was  intolerably  severe,  and  no  one  went 
out  of  their  tents,  or  if  they  went  out,  wrapt  them- 
selves up  carefully,  and  put  fleeces  under  their  feet, 
and  bound  their  legs  with  hairy  skins,  Socrates  went 
out  only  with  the  same  cloak  on  that  he  usually  wore, 
and  walked  barefoot  upon  the  ice;  more  easily,  indeed,  . 
than  those  who  had  sandalled  themselves  so  delicately : 
so  that  the  soldiers  thought  that  he  did  it  to  mock 
their  want  of  fortitude.  It  would  indeed  be  worth 
while  to  commemorate  all  that  this  brave  man  did  and 
endured  in  that  expedition.  .  .  . 

But  to  see  Socrates  when  our  army  was  defeated 
and  scattered  in  flight  at  Delium,  was  a  spectacle 
worthy  to  behold.  On  that  occasion  I  was  among  the 
cavalry,  and  he  on  foot,  heavily  armed.  After  the 
total  rout  of  our  troops,  he  and  Laches  retreated  to- 
gether; I  came  up  by  chance,  and  seeing  them,  bade 
them  be  of  good  cheer,  for  that  I  would  not  leave  them. 
As  I  was  on  horseback,  and  therefore  less  occupied  by 
a  regard  of  my  own  situation,  I  could  better  observe 
than  at  Potidsa  the  beautiful  spectacle  exhibited  by 
Socrates  on  this  emergency.  How  superior  was  he 
to  Laches  in  presence  of  mind  and  courage!  Your 
representation  of  him  on  the  stage,  O  Aristophanes, 
was  not  wholly  unlike  his  real  self  on  this  occasion; 
for  he  walked  and  darted  his  regards  around  with  a 
majestic  composure,  looking  tranquilly  both  on  his 
friends  and  enemies;  so  that  it  was  evident  to  every 
one,  even  from  afar,  that  whoever  should  venture 
to  attack  him  would  encounter  a  desperate  resistance. 
He  and  his  companion  thus  departed  in  safety;  for 
those  who  are  scattered  in  flight  are  pursued  and  killed, 


SOCRATES  265 

whilst  men  hesitate  to  touch  those  who  exhibit  such 
a  countenance  as  that  of  Socrates  even  in  defeat. 

By  the  side  of  this  account  of  the  soldier 
may  be  placed  the  companion  picture  of  the 
philosopher,  found  in  the  same  dialogue  and 
spoken  by  the  same  person.  It  sets  forth 
clearly  the  double  nature  of  the  man.  Without 
he  might  be  likened  to  the  rude  figures  of  Silenus, 
the  grotesque  companion  of  Bacchus,  which 
were  fashioned  by  the  artificers  as  caskets  to 
hold  within  precious  images  of  the  gods  in  gold 
and  silver.     The  translation  is  again  Shelley's: 

I  will  begin  the  praise  of  Socrates  by  comparing 
him  to  a  certain  statue.  Perhaps  he  will  think  that 
this  statue  is  introduced  for  the  sake  of  ridicule,  but 
I  assure  you  that  it  is  necessary  for  the  illustration  of 
truth.  I  assert,  then,  that  Socrates  is  exactly  like 
those  Silenuses  that  sit  in  the  sculptors'  shops,  and 
which  are  carved  holding  flutes  or  pipes,  but  which, 
when  divided  into  two  are  found  to  contain  withinside 
the  images  of  the  gods.  I  assert  that  Socrates  is  like 
the  satyr  Marsyas.  That  your  form  and  appearance 
are  like  these  satyrs,  I  think  that  even  you  will  not 
venture  to  deny;  and  how  like  you  are  to  them  in  all 
other  things,  now  hear.  Are  you  not  scornful  and 
petulant?  If  you  deny  this,  I  will  bring  witnesses.  Are 
you  not  a  piper  and  far  more  wonderful  a  one  than  he  ? 
.  . ,  .  You  differ  only  from  Marsyas  in  this  circumstance, 
that  you  effect  without  instruments,  by  mere  words,  all 
that  he  can  do.  For  when  we  hear  Pericles,  or  any  other 
accomplished  orator,  deliver  a  discourse,  no  one,  as  it 
were,  cares  anything  about  it.  But  when  any  one 
hears  you,  or  even  your  words  related  by  another, 


266  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

though  ever  so  rude  and  unskilful  a  speaker,  be  that 
person  a  woman,  man,  or  child,  we  are  struck  and 
retained,  as  it  were,  by  the  discourse  clinging  to  our 
minds.  .  .  , 

At  first  I  forgot  to  make  you  observe  how  like  his 
discourses  are  to  those  Satyrs  when  they  are  opened, 
for,  if  any  one  will  listen  to  the  talk  of  Socrates,  it 
will  appear  to  him  at  first  extremely  ridiculous;  the 
phrases  and  expressions  which  he  employs,  fold  around 
his  exterior  the  skin,  as  it  were,  of  a  rude  and  wanton 
Satyr.  He  is  always  talking  about  great  market-asses, 
and  brass-founders,  and  leather-cutters,  and  skin- 
dressers;  and  this  is  his  perpetual  custom,  so  that  any 
dull  and  unobservant  person  might  easily  laugh  at 
his  discourse.  But  if  any  one  should  see  it  opened, 
as  it  were,  and  get  within  the  sense  of  his  words,  he 
would  then  find  that  they  alone  of  all  that  enters  into 
the  mind  of  man  to  utter,  had  a  profound  and  persua- 
sive meaning,  and  that  they  were  most  divine;  and 
that  they  presented  to  the  mind  innumerable  images 
of  every  excellence,  and  that  they  tended  towards 
objects  of  the  highest  moment,  or  rather  towards  all, 
that  he  who  seeks  the  possession  of  what  is  supremely 
beautiful  and  good,  need  regard  as  essential  to  the 
accomplishment  of  his  ambition. 


It  is  not  hard  to  understand  how  this  curious 
compound,  this  "rare  coincidence,  in  one  ugly 
body,  of  the  droll  and  the  martyr,  the  keen 
street  and  market  debater  with  the  sweetest 
saint  known  to  any  history  at  that  time," 
with  his  gross  physical  passions  and  sublime 
self-control,  as  if  now  and  here  the  extreme 
dualism  of  human  nature  had  become  incarnate 


SOCRATES  267 

and  was  walking  about  the  ways  of  Athens, — 
it  is  not  hard  to  understand  how  he  was  able 
to  fascinate  the  inquisitive  and  the  more  serious 
of  the  Greek  youth.  But  Socrates,  dearly  as 
he  loved  his  native  city,  belonged  not  to  a  city  or 
country,  but  to  the  world.  This  wider  influence 
is  due  in  part  to  the  genius  of  his  great  disciple 
Plato,  who  developed  the  teaching  of  the  master 
into  a  splendid  body  of  philosophy, — but  not 
entirely,  nor  is  writing  the  only  means  by  which 
a  man's  influence  may  lay  hold  of  posterity. 
Socrates  wrote  nothing,  and  he  cannot  be  said 
to  have  founded  a  philosophical  system;  he 
made  little  or  no  use  of  metaphysical  language, 
and  indeed  one  may  say  that  philosophy  ceases 
to  be  vital  just  in  proportion  as  it  involves  itself 
in  technical  terms.  But  Socrates  gave  the 
impulse  to  a  new  way  of  approaching  the  peren- 
nial questions  that  interest  and  trouble  man's 
soul.  By  his  life  and  death  he  gave  to  doubting 
men  renewed  assurance  that  virtue  is  the  only 
real  happiness,  more  to  be  desired  than  riches 
or  honour  or  power  or  life  itself,  and  that  there 
is  a  lamp  of  truth  to  guide  us  in  virtue's  path. 
The  Greeks  themselves  saw  the  beginning  of 
their  philosophy,  as  they  found  the  origin  of 
everything  else,  in  Homer,  whom  Plato  half 
sportively  calls  the  first  of  those  philosophers 
who  made  continual  flux  and  change  the  law 
of  life.     For  us  Greek  philosophy  begins  about 


268  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  year  600  B.C.,  when  Thales  of  Miletus 
attempted  to  account  for  the  origin  of  things 
without  the  intervention  of  mythology.  Thales 
saw  in  water  the  source  of  the  world  and  of 
the  gods  themselves;  and  after  him  followed 
a  succession  of  philosophers  who  tried  in  various 
ways  to  explain  the  physical  universe,  making 
no  distinction,  according  to  Aristotle,  between 
matter  and  the  moving  or  governing  force. 
Anaxagoras  first  introduced  the  conception  of 
mind  as  a  guiding  principle  apart  from  matter; 
and  Socrates  in  all  probability  knew  Anaxagoras 
in  Athens,  and  may  even  have  been  his  pupil  in 
some  indefinite  way.  We  are  told  in  the  Phcedo 
that  Socrates  as  a  young  man  was  enthusiastic 
over  this  sort  of  natural  philosophy,  and  thought 
it  a  prodigious  thing  to  know  the  causes  of 
creation  and  dissolution.  Baffled,  however, 
in  his  efforts  to  acquire  such  knowledge,  he  was 
at  last  directed  to  the  books  of  Anaxagoras, 
and  here  he  thought  he  had  found  in  the  new 
doctrine  of  "mind"  the  wisdom  he  had  so  long 
sought.  But  once  again  he  was  deceived,  for 
Anaxagoras  was  still  in  bondage  to  physical 
causes  and  made  no  satisfactory  use  of  his 
boasted  theory  of  "the  mind,"  so  that  Socrates 
in  disgust  turned  away  from  these  philosophers 
altogether  and  declared  the  utter  futility  of 
natural  science. 

And  after  all,  why  should  any  one  pry  into  the 


SOCRATES  269 

heavens  above  and  into  the  earth  beneath  when 
he  is  still  ignorant  of  himself  and  his  own  soul? 
This  was  the  great  revolution  brought  about 
by  Socrates:  he  taught  men  to  look  into  them- 
selves, for  through  self-knowledge  lay  the  only 
path  to  truth  and  virtue  and  happiness;  and 
these  three  are  one.  Justice,  temperance, courage, 
— all  the  virtues  are  but  different  manifestations 
of  the  one  comprehensive  virtue  which  is  wisdom 
or  self-knowledge.  The  reasoning  of  Socrates 
is  quite  simple:  every  man  aims  to  do  what  he 
thinks  best  for  himself,  and  if  he  does  what 
injures  himself,  it  must  be  through  ignorance; 
virtue  is  the  knowledge  of  what  is  truly  best, 
what  is  best  for  the  real  self.  Socrates  takes 
no  account  of  the  estrangement  of  the  will  and 
the  understanding,  of  that  morbid  state  which 
led  Ovid  to  cry  out:  "I  see  the  better  things 
and  approve,  I  follow  the  worse."  He  had 
indeed  never  dissected  the  soul  into  these  di- 
vergent faculties;  and  in  Greece  until  his  time 
the  harmony  of  man's  nature  scarcely  permitted 
such  an  analysis.  The  separation,  first  care- 
fully noted  by  Plato,  came  with  this  very  self- 
consciousness  which  was  introduced  into  Greek 
life  by  Socrates  more  than  by  any  other.  If  to 
us,  with  our  larger  experience,  so  simple  a 
view  of  human  nature  may  seem  superficial, 
we  must  yet  remember  that  to-day  the  great 
struggle  for  each  man  is  to  restore  himself  to 


270  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

just  that  state  of  health  wherein  the  will  and  the 
understanding  are  in  harmonious  equilibrium. 

But  Socrates  was  not  alone  in  bringing  phi- 
losophy down  from  the  skies  to  the  human 
heart.  About  this  time  there  sprang  up  that 
remarkable  class  of  teachers  called  sophists, 
who  travelled  from  city  to  city,  lecturing  on 
every  kind  of  subject,  and  especially  teaching 
men  the  art  of  rhetoric.  They  were  not  a 
philosophical  sect,  and  had  as  a  body  no  special 
doctrine  to  proclaim;  but  they  all,  without 
offering  any  sure  guide  in  exchange,  influenced 
their  hearers  to  question  the  old  traditional 
notions  of  right  and  wrong;  whereas  Socrates 
in  his  pursuit  of  self-knowledge  sought  to  dis- 
cover within  himself  the  origin  of  those  "un- 
written laws"  which  are  the  source  of  universal 
virtue,  the  same  in  all  men,  the  bond  connect- 
ing mankind  and  the  gods.  The  sophists,  in- 
structing men  in  the  art  of  practical  debate, 
would  teach  them  how  "to  make  the  worse 
appear  the  better  cause,"  not  in  the  interests 
of  vice,  to  be  sure,  but  simply  holding  truth 
as  a  light  or  impossible  thing;  Socrates  believed 
the  only  occupation  worthy  of  a  free  man  was 
the  earnest  discussion  of  truth  and  virtue  among 
friends. 

It  is  one  of  the  curious  acts  of  an  ironical 
Fate  that  Protagoras  and  his  fellows  were  for 
many  years  loaded  with  honours  in  Athens  and, 


SOCRATES  271 

throughout  Greece,  whereas  Socrates  was  rid- 
iculed on  the  stage  and  finally  suffered  death 
for  that  very  dangerous  side  of  sophistical 
teaching  which  he  sought  to  counteract.  The 
Clouds  of  Aristophanes  is  a  drolly  conceived 
caricature,  which  represents  Socrates  as  every- 
thing which  he  really  was  not.  He  is  there  set 
forth  as  a  master  of  a  school  called  the  phron- 
tisterion,  or  thinking-shop,  himself  a  pale,  woe- 
begone student  and  his  scholars  only  worse. 
When  first  seen  he  is  swinging  aloft  in  a  basket, 
the  better  to  observe  the  sun;  and  in  place  of 
Zeus  he  has  set  up  a  new  god  by  the  name  of 
Vortex.  The  whole  play  is  as  comical  as  it  is 
scathing,  yet  tradition  states  that  during  the 
performance  Socrates,  with  his  accustomed 
imperturbability,  arose  in  his  place  that  the 
audience  might  compare  his  own  grotesque  face 
with  the  mask  of  the  actor  personating  him  on 
the  stage. 

The  play  alone  might  pass  as  a  harmless 
satire,  but  it  signified  only  too  well  the  growing 
discontent  with  Socrates  in  the  city.  The 
causes  of  the  popular  feeling  against  him  are  set 
forth  in  the  Apology,  and  need  not  be  repeated. 
One  of  the  causes,  however,  may  have  been 
more  important  than  Plato's  passing  notice  of  it 
might  lead  us  to  suppose.  Critias  and  Alcibiades 
and  others  of  the  aristocratical  party,  now  justly 
odious  to  the  people,  had  in  their  youth  been 


272  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

followers  of  Socrates,  and  despite  his  precaution 
in  avoiding  public  affairs,  politics  may  thus 
have  entered  into  his  final  ruin.  In  the  year 
399  B.C.  he  was  arraigned  before  one  of  the 
courts  on  a  charge  of  impiety,  and  was  con- 
demned. His  death  came  at  the  turning-point 
of  Greek  history;  and  from  that  time  on  we  have 
to  trace  the  gradual  decline  of  the  strength 
and  beauty  of  that  old  life,  and  to  follow 
the  development  of  the  spirit  which  was  to 
give  birth  to  the  modern  world.  The  heroic 
struggle  of  Socrates  with  the  Athenian  people 
may  be  regarded  as  typical  of  the  long  contest 
that  was  to  follow.  The  harmony  of  Greek 
life  was  broken,  by  the  accession  of  self-con- 
sciousness, into  two  divergent  currents:  the 
nation  as  a  body  pursued  the  easy  path  of 
sophistry  into  an  ever  deeper  and  deeper  deg- 
radation of  moral  indifference;  a  few  men, 
handing  on  the  new  ideal  of  the  master  and 
developing  its  latent  philosophy,  prepared  the 
way  for  the  more  efficient  and  in  some  respects 
antagonistic  revelation  of  Christianity,  and  for 
the  Platonism  that  has  united  in  one  family 
all  the  spiritually  minded  inquirers  of  the  ages. 
Yet  we  must  never  forget  that  the  teaching 
of  the  Athenian  sage  still  in  its  simplest  form 
persists  through  all  its  later  developments,  and 
still  is  one  of  the  powers  working  for  truth  and 
righteousness  in  the  world. 


SOCRATES  273 

The  Apology  and  Crito,  with  the  closing  scene 
of  the  Phcsdo,  form  a  little  group  apart  from  the 
other  dialogues  of  Plato.  Here  for  a  while  the 
philosopher  lays  aside  his  speculations  and 
presents  us  with  a  simple  and  noble  picture 
of  his  master's  last  days.  These  scenes  have 
been  translated  many  times,  and,  like  all  works 
of  great  and  baffling  excellence,  will  forever 
tempt  new  hands.  In  the  translation  of  the 
Apology  which  here  follows,  I  have  aimed  at 
simple  faithfulness  to  the  original. 


x8 


THE  APOLOGY 1 

[The  Apology,  or  as  we  should  say  now  defence,  of 
Socrates  consists  of  three  distinct  parts, — the  apology 
proper,  his  speech  on  the  penalty  to  be  imposed,  and 
his  farewell.  He  was  tried  before  one  of  the  regular 
courts  composed  of  five  hundred  citizens  who  were 
chosen  by  lot.  and  whom  we  commonly  call  judges, 
though  their  function  was  rather  that  of  a  jury.  The 
court  was  presided  over  by  the  Archon  basileus,  before 
whom  cases  of  impiety  regularly  came.  In  criminal  trials 
the  State  was  not  a  partj-,  but  some  citizen,  usually 
one  personally  concerned,  acted  as  plaintiff.  In  this 
case  the  plaintiff  is  a  certain  Meletus,  a  young  man 
apparently  of  no  special  standing,  who  is  assisted  by 
the  older  and  more  influential  Anytus  and  Lycon. 
There  were  no  regular  law^-ers  to  plead  in  the  Athenian 
courts,  but  plaintiff  and  defendant  were  obhged  to 
speak  for  themselves,  Plato  was  present  at  the  trial, 
but  whether  he  reports  the  speech  of  Socrates  with  any 
accuracy,  or  substitutes  a  rhetorical  exercise  of  his 
own,  is  a  question  of  great  interest  not  easy  to  decide. 
Most  critics  believe  that,  while  the  words  are  Plato's, 
the  Apology  is  in  substance  the  actual  speech  of  Soc- 
rates. Certainly  we  have  here  a  noble  and  faithful 
pictxire  of  the  master's  life.] 

How  you  have  felt,  men  of  Athens,  while  my 

»  Cop\-right  iSqS  by  Houghton,  ilifflin  &  Company, 
an  rights  reserved. 

274 


THE  APOLOGY  275 

accusers  were  speaking,  I  cannot  tell;  as  for 
myself,  I  almost  forgot  who  I  was,  so  persuasive 
were  their  words,  although,  if  I  may  say  it, 
not  a  single  word  they  spoke  was  true.  But 
of  all  their  falsehoods  this  one  amazed  me  most, 
that  they  should  dare  to  bid  you  be  on  your 
guard  against  me  and  not  be  deceived  by  my 
skilful  pleading;  for  they  must  have  known 
that  their  falsehood  would  be  exposed  the  mo- 
ment I  opened  my  mouth  and  showed  myself 
the  owner  of  no  such  skill  at  all.  Really  this 
must  have  been  mere  wanton  insolence  on  their 
part,  unless  indeed  they  call  a  man  eloquent  who 
simply  speaks  the  truth.  If  that  is  their  mean- 
ing, I  might  confess  myself  an  orator — only  not 
after  the  manner  of  these  men,  for  in  their 
words  there  was  no  truth  at  all,  whereas  in 
mine  you  shall  hear  the  truth  and  the  whole 
truth.  Do  not  then  expect  from  me,  Athenians, 
an  elaborate  oration  like  theirs,  decked  out  and 
daintily  adorned  with  fine  phrases — God  forbid. 
You  shall  hear  whatever  language  comes  up- 
permost, for  I  trust  that  what  I  am  going  to 
say  is  right  and  just,  and  that  is  sufficient ;  let 
no  one  expect  anything  else.  Neither  would 
it  be  seemly  at  my  time  of  life  to  come  before 
you  with  cunningly  prepared  phrases  like  a 
young  man.  But  this  one  thing  above  all  I 
ask  and  beg  of  you,  men  of  Athens:  if  you  hear 
me    defending  myself   with    the   same   sort    of 


276  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

words  I  have  always  used  about  the  money- 
changers' tables  in  the  market-place,  where 
many  of  you  have  heard  me  talk,  or  anywhere 
else,  do  not  be  surprised  at  this  and  do  not 
interrupt  me.  The  simple  fact  is,  this  is  the 
first  time  I  have  ever  appeared  in  a  law-court, 
although  I  am  now  seventy  years  old ;  and  conse- 
quently I  am  a  complete  stranger  to  the  language 
of  the  place.  You  would  readily  have  patience 
with  me  if  I  were  really  a  foreigner  and  spoke 
after  the  language  and  fashion  of  the  land  where 
I  grew  up;  and  now  in  the  same  way  I  may 
claim  the  privilege,  I  think,  of  asking  you  to 
overlook  my  manner  of  speech — it  might  be 
better  and  it  might  be  worse — and  to  mark 
this  and  fix  your  minds  on  this  question  alone, 
whether  what  I  say  is  justified  by  the  facts 
or  not.  For  this  is  the  judge's  office,  as  the 
orator's  is  to  speak  the  truth. 

In  the  first  place,  then,  it  behooves  me,  men 
of  Athens,  to  answer  first  the  old  lying  charges 
against  me  and  my  earlier  accusers,  and  after 
that  these  later  ones.  For  I  have  had  many 
accusers  before  you  now  these  many  years, 
whose  slanders  have  gained  strength  with  age, 
and  whom  I  fear  more  than  Anytus  and  his 
accomplices,  although  these,  too,  may  well 
fill  me  with  alarm.  But  those  are  the  more 
dangerous  who  began  to  instil  their  slanders 
into  your  ears  when  you  were  children,   and 


THE  APOLOGY  277 

taught  you  that  there  is  one  Socrates,  a  phi- 
losopher, who  speculates  about  the  heavens 
above  and  pries  into  the  earth  beneath,  and 
makes  the  worse  appear  the  better  cause. 
These  men,  Athenians,  who  have  scattered 
abroad  rumours  like  this,  are  my  serious  accusers. 
Their  hearers  are  only  too  quick  to  fancy  that 
all  speculators  of  the  kind  are  natural  athe- 
ists. Besides  that,  these  accusers  are  many  and 
their  charges  are  of  long  standing:  they  began 
with  you  in  childhood,  or  in  youth,  perhaps, 
when  the  mind  is  quick  to  believe ;  and  the  case 
went  against  me  by  default,  there  being  none 
to  answer.  And,  strangest  of  all,  it  is  im- 
possible to  know  even  their  names  and  tell 
you  who  they  are — unless  it  be  perhaps  some 
comic  poet.  And  how  shall  I  deal  with  those 
who  have  won  your  ears  through  sheer  envy 
and  malignity,  and  with  those,  too,  who  first 
honestly  convinced  themselves  and  then  per- 
suaded others?  I  cannot  summon  any  one  of 
them  here  before  you  and  confute  him,  but  I 
must  make  my  defence  as  a  man  fights  with 
shadows,  and  question  when  there  is  none  to 
answer. — Well,  as  I  was  saying,  you  are  to 
understand  that  I  have  two  sets  of  accusers, — 
those  who  have  brought  the  present  indict- 
ment against  me,  and  others  of  older  date  whom 
I  have  just  mentioned.  You  will  understand 
also  why  I  turn  to  these  ancient  accusers  first, 


278  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

since  you  heard  their  charges  first  and  much 
oftener,  too,  than  the  recent  charges.  Very- 
well,  gentlemen,  you  shall  hear  my  apology. 
In  this  brief  time  allotted  ^  me  I  must  endeavour 
to  overcome  your  long-standing  prejudices. 
Gladly  would  I  prosper  in  my  attempt  and  come 
out  well  from  my  defence,  if  it  were  better  for 
you  and  for  me.  The  task  is  not  easy,  nay,  I 
know  too  well  how  hard  it  is ;  yet  be  the  issue  as 
God  wills,  it  is  mine  to  obey  the  law  and  render 
my  apology. 

Let  us  go  back  to  the  beginning  and  see  from 
what  accusation  arose  the  calumnies  which  now 
embolden  Meletus  to  bring  forward  his  indict- 
ment. How  have  these  backbiters  been  slander- 
ing me?  Let  us  read  their  affidavit  as  if  they 
accused  me  legally:  "Socrates  is  an  evil-doer 
and  a  busybody  who  investigates  what  is  be- 
neath the  earth  and  above  in  the  heavens,  who 
makes  the  worse  appear  the  better  cause,  and 
imparts  these  notions  to  others." — Such  is  the 
accusation;  and  you  yourselves  have  seen  in 
the  comedy  of  Aristophanes  how  one  Socrates  is 
exhibited  swung  about  in  a  basket,  declaring 
that  he  treads  the  air  and  uttering  a  deal  of 
nonsense  regarding  things  of  which  I  have  no 
knowledge  at  all.  I  do  not  mean  to  speak  in 
contempt  of  such  knowledge,  if  there  be  any  one 

»  Each  speaker  was  allotted  a  certain  time  by  the 
clepsydra,  or  water-clock. 


THE  APOLOGY  279 

really  wise  in  these  matters — may  no  Meletus, 
I  pray,  bring  such  a  charge  against  me — I  merely 
say,  Athenians,  that  I  myself  have  nothing  to 
do  with  them.  Most  of  you  who  are  present  here 
will  confirm  me  in  this :  many  of  you  are  familiar 
with  my  mode  of  talking,  and  I  may  call  on  you 
to  testify  for  me  to  your  neighbours;  tell  them 
now  whether  any  one  of  you  ever  heard  me 
say  anything  whatsoever,  in  few  words  or  many, 
about  these  matters.  From  this  you  may 
assume  that  the  other  stories  current  about  me 
are  of  the  same  fabrication. 

And  furthermore,  if  you  have  heard  any  one 
assert  that  I  undertake  to  give  instruction  and 
demand  fees,  this  is  equally  false.  Yet  I  am 
ready  to  admit  such  a  course  would  be  perfectly 
honourable  if  one  were  really  able  to  give  instruc- 
tion,— like  Gorgias  of  Leontini,  for  instance,  and 
Prodicus  of  Ceos,  and  Hippias  of  Elis,  each  of 
whom  travels  about  from  city  to  city  and  cun- 
ningly persuades  the  young  men  to  leave  their 
fellow  townsmen  whose  instruction  they  might 
have  quite  freely  and  without  price,  and  to 
follow  after  the  new  master  at  considerable 
cost  and  with  gratitude  besides.  There  is  an- 
other of  these  philosophers,  a  Parian,  who,  I 
understand,  is  in  the  city  at  this  moment,  I 
heard  of  him  from  a  man  who  has  probably 
spent  more  money  on  these  sophists  than  any- 
body else  in  the  world, — I  mean  Callias,  the  son 


28o  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  Hipponicus.  Happening  to  fall  in  with 
him  one  day,  I  began  to  question  him  about 
his  two  sons:  "Callias,"  said  I,  "if  your  two 
boys  were  only  foals  or  calves,  we  should  know 
well  enough  where  to  hire  a  master  who  would 
train  them  so  as  to  bring  out  their  best  qualities ; 
some  horse-breeder  or  farmer  would  serve  our 
purpose.  But  now,  seeing  they  are  men,  what 
master  have  you  in  mind  for  them?  Do  you 
know  any  one  who  has  made  a  science  of  bring- 
ing out  the  qualities  necessary  to  a  man  and  a 
citizen?  No  doubt  you  have  looked  into  the 
matter  on  account  of  these  sons  of  yours.  Is 
there  any  such  master? "  "To  be  sure  there  is," 
he  replied.  "Who,"  said  I,  "and  whence  does 
he  hail,  and  what  is  his  fee?"  "Evenus,  the 
Parian,  my  Socrates ;  and  he  charges  five  minse."  ^ 
Happy  Evenus,  thought  I  to  myself,  if  he  in 
sooth  possesses  this  art  and  teaches  so  reason- 
ably. How  I  should  plume  myself,  and  how 
conceited  I  should  be,  if  I  had  this  wisdom. 
But  alas,  Athenians,  I  have  it  not. 

Perhaps  some  one  may  retort:  But,  Socrates, 
what  have  you  done  then?  Why  have  all  these 
calumnies  sprung  up  against  you?  For  unless 
you  had  shown  yourself  a  busybody  in  some  way 
or  other  and  had  acted  differently  from  other 
people,  surely  all  this  talk  and  rumour  would 
never  have  got   about.     We   do   not  wish   to 

>The  mina  was  equivalent  to  about  $i8. 


THE  APOLOGY  281 

judge  you  unadvisedly ;  tell  us  the  whole  story. — 
Now  this  seems  to  me  a  fair  request,  and  I  will 
try  to  explain  how  I  came  by  such  an  ill-omened 
name.  Hear  me  out;  I  mean  to  tell  the  whole 
truth,  though  to  some  of  you  it  will  sound  like 
a  tale  told  in  jest.  The  fact  is,  men  of  Athens, 
I  got  this  name  because  of  a  sort  of  wisdom 
in  me  and  for  no  other  reason.  What  sort  of 
wisdom,  you  ask?  Well,  it  might  be  called 
strictly  human  wisdom,  for  really  I  may  claim 
a  share  of  that.  These  philosophers  I  mentioned 
just  now  possibly  possess  some  wisdom  of  a 
higher  sort,  something  superhuman — I  hardly 
know  how  to  name  it,  for  I  myself  have  no  part 
in  it,  and  whoever  says  I  have  lies  and  utters 
a  slander.  I  beg  you,  Athenians,  do  not  cry 
out  if  I  appear  to  speak  boastfully;  the  word  I 
shall  speak,  however  it  sound,  is  not  of  me  but 
of  a  greater,  and  he  who  uttered  it  is  worthy 
of  credence.  Of  this  wisdom  of  mine,  if  so  be 
I  have  any,  and  of  its  nature,  I  offer  to  you  as 
witness  the  god  who  abides  at  Delphi.  Chae- 
rephon  you  certainly  know.  He  was  my  friend 
from  youth  up;  he  was  a  friend  of  the  people, 
too,  following  you  in  the  recent  exile  ^  and  re- 
turning with  you.  You  know  the  man,  how 
eager  he  was  in  all  his  ventures.  Well,  Chasre- 
phon  once  took  upon  himself  to  go  to  Delphi 

>  In  404  B.C.,  when  the  oligarchy  of  the  Thirty  was 
in  power. 


282  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

and  inquire  of  the  oracle  there — now  I  beseech 
you,  Athenians,  hear  me  quietly;  he  inquired 
of  the  oracle  whether  there  was  any  one  wiser 
than  I,  and  the  Pythian  priestess  declared 
there  was  none  wiser.  He  himself  is  dead,  but 
his  brother  is  present  to-day  and  will  testify 
to  these  things. 

Perhaps  you  may  wonder  why  I  relate  this 
story:  it  is  because  I  am  going  to  show  you 
how  the  calumnies  rose  against  me.  For  when 
the  oracle  was  brought  to  me,  I  began  to  ask 
myself.  What  does  the  god  mean,  and  what  is 
the  reading  of  his  riddle?  Certainly  so  far  as 
I  know  myself  I  am  not  conscious  of  being  wise 
in  any  matter  great  or  small.  What,  then,  does 
he  mean  by  calling  me  the  wisest  ?  At  any  rate 
he  does  not  lie,  for  that  were  contrary  to  his 
nature. — So  for  a  long  while  I  was  in  doubt 
about  the  oracle,  until  at  length  I  bethought  me 
of  the  following  method  of  testing  it.  I  went 
straight  to  one  of  our  reputed  wise  men,  thinking 
that  here,  if  anywhere,  I  should  be  able  to  refute 
the  oracle  and  say  to  the  god.  Look  you!  this 
man  is  wiser  than  I,  and  yet  you  call  me  wisest. 
Well,  I  examined'this  man  (never  mind  his  name, 
but  my  first  adventure  was  with  one  of  our 
politicians)  and  conversed  with  him,  and  it  soon 
became  apparent  that  to  many  people  and  most 
of  all  to  himself  he  seemed  quite  wise,  whereas  in 
truth  he  was  not  so  at  all.     Thereupon  I  under- 


THE  APOLOGY  283 

took  to  show  him  how  he  was  wise  in  opinion 
only  and  not  in  reality ;  but  I  only  made  myself 
a  nuisance  to  him  and  to  many  of  those  about 
him.  So  I  went  away  reflecting  that  at  least 
I  was  wiser  than  this  man.  Neither  of  us 
apparently  knows  anything  much  worth  while, 
but  he  in  his  ignorance  thinks  he  knows,  whereas 
I  neither  know  nor  think  I  know.  Surely  I 
may  claim  a  little  more  of  wisdom  than  he,  in 
so  far  as  I  do  not  think  I  know  what  I  do  not 
know.  After  this  I  approached  one  whose 
character  for  wisdom  was  still  higher,  but 
with  no  different  result;  I  only  gained  the  ill 
will  of  him  and  a  host  of  others. 

So  I  went  from  one  to  another  in  succession, 
perceiving  all  the  while  that  I  was  but  making 
enemies,  sorrowing  and  fearing,  and  yet  com- 
pelled, as  it  were,  to  honour  the  god  above  all 
things  and  to  prove  his  oracle  by  approaching 
all  who  were  reputed  to  have  any  knowledge. 
And  I  swear  by  the  dog.i  men  of  Athens — for 
I  must  declare  the  truth — I  swear  that  this  was 
all  my  profit.  Searching  by  command  of  the 
god,  I  found  that  those  who  had  the  greatest 
renown  for  wisdom  were  in  general  the  most 
lacking  of  all,  whereas  others  of  no  reputation 
were   really   the  better   and  wiser  men.     But 

»  Socrates'  favourite  oath.  Tradition  says  that 
Rhadamanthys  forbade  swearing  by  the  gods,  but 
permitted  such  a  use  of  the  names  of  animals. 


284  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

let  me  narrate  my  wanderings  in  detail  and  the 
labours  I  endured,  like  a  second  Heracles,  to 
confirm  the  oracle  to  my  own  mind.  After 
the  politicians  I  went  to  the  poets,  tragic, 
dithyrambic,  and  what  not,  making  sure  that 
in  comparison  with  these  I  should  detect  myself 
in  the  very  act  of  folly.  I  took  their  own  poems 
which  they  had  apparently  elaborated  with  the 
greatest  care,  and  with  these  in  my  hand  pro- 
ceeded to  ask  the  authors  what  they  signified, 
expecting,  of  course,  to  pick  up  some  curious 
information  at  the  same  time.  I  am  ashamed 
to  tell  you  the  truth,  my  friends,  and  yet  it  must 
out.  Will  you  believe  me,  almost  any  one  here 
in  this  court  would  speak  more  intelligently 
about  these  works  than  the  authors  themselves. 
I  very  soon  learned  of  the  poets  that  they  com- 
pose not  by  wisdom  but  by  a  certain  inspiration 
and  gift  of  nature,  like  diviners  and  soothsayers, 
who  in  the  same  way  utter  many  noble  senti- 
ments, yet  understand  nothing  of  what  they 
say.  Such  appeared  to  be  the  state  of  the  poets ; 
yet  I  perceived  that  deluded  by  their  poetic 
genius  they  deemed  themselves  the  wisest  of 
men  in  other  matters  also,  wherein  they  were 
nothing.  So  I  gave  up  the  poets  too,  think- 
ing I  surpassed  them  in  the  same  way  as  the 
politicians. 

Finally    I    went    to    the    artisans.     Here    at 
least  I  had  no  knowledge  at  all,  and  I  was  sure 


THE  APOLOGY  285 

to  find  these  men  skilled  in  many  noble  crafts. 
And  in  this  I  was  not  deceived;  they  knew  what 
I  did  not  know  and  in  so  far  were  wiser  than  I. 
Nevertheless  these  excellent  artisans,  as  I  dis- 
covered, had  the  same  weakness  as  the  poets; 
because  they  wrought  well  in  their  own  craft, 
every  one  of  them  deemed  himself  most  wise 
in  other  weighty  matters;  and  this  error  went 
far  to  obscure  their  real  wisdom.  Come,  then, 
I  said  to  myself,  in  behalf  of  the  oracle,  will  you 
be  content  with  your  present  lot,  being  neither 
wise  in  the  wisdom  of  these  men  nor  foolish  in 
their  folly,  or  would  you  choose  their  dubious 
state?  And  immediately  I  answered  to  myself 
and  to  the  oracle  that  it  was  better  for  me  as  I 
am. 

From  this  investigation,  men  of  Athens, 
many  enmities  sprang  up  against  me,  such  as 
are  grievous  and  dangerous,  and  such  as  gave 
birth  to  a  host  of  slanders;  from  thence,  too, 
arose  the  name  I  had  of  being  wise.  Those 
who  are  present  always  take  it  for  granted  that 
I  myself  am  wise  in  those  things  wherein  I  expose 
the  ignorance  of  others.  But  the  truth  would 
seem  to  be,  Athenians,  that  God  alone  is  really 
wise,  and  this  he  sets  forth  in  the  oracle,  signify- 
ing that  human  wisdom  is  worth  little  or  nothing 
at  all.  Neither  doth  he  care  aught  for  Socrates, 
but  merely  employed  my  name,  using  me  as  an 
illustration,  as  if  to  say:  Hear,  all  ye  men!  he  is 


286  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

wisest  among  you  who,  like  Socrates,  knows 
that  his  wisdom  is  of  nothing  worth.  And  I 
even  to  this  day  go  about  seeking  as  the  god 
wills,  and  am  ever  on  the  scent,  if  perchance 
any  citizen  or  stranger  may  appear  to  me  truly 
wise.  And  when  he  proves  other  than  wise, 
then,  in  vindication  of  the  god,  I  expose  the 
man's  ignorance.  And  by  reason  of  this  task 
laid  upon  me  I  have  no  leisure  for  the  important 
affairs  of  State  and  home,  but  live  always  in 
utter  poverty  as  a  servant  of  the  god. 

In  addition  to  this,  many  young  men  from 
our  wealthy  families,  who  have  nothing  else 
to  do,  flock  after  me  unbidden  and  take  delight 
in  hearing  my  cross-questionings.  Indeed,  they 
often  imitate  me,  trying  their  wit  at  refuting 
others;  and  I  dare  say  they  find  plenty  of  men 
ready  at  hand  who  pretend  to  know,  but  really 
know  little  or  nothing  at  all.  Straightway 
these  pretenders,  on  being  exposed,  fall  into  a 
rage  against  me,  instead  of  blaming  themselves, 
and  call  down  curses  on  this  Socrates  who  is 
corrupting  our  young  men.  And  when  they 
are  asked  what  this  Socrates  does  and  teaches, 
they  are  at  a  loss,  having  nothing  to  say ;  and  so 
they  try  to  cover  up  their  confusion  by  repeating 
the  old  trumpery  charges  against  the  whole  body 
of  philosophers  about  things  in  heaven  and 
beneath  the  earth,  you  know,  and  atheism, 
and  making  the  worse  appear  the  better  cause. 


THE  APOLOGY  287 

They  are  not  likely  to  confess  the  truth,  that 
they  have  been  detected  in  assuming  knowledge 
which  they  never  had.  These  men  are  self- 
important  and  revengeful  and  numerous,  and 
so,  I  think,  with  their  loud  and  overbearing 
words  they  have  dinned  these  ancient  and  bitter 
slanders  into  your  ears.  No  doubt  this  is  why 
Meletus  and  Anytus  and  Lycon  have  set  upon 
me, — Meletus  having  a  grudge  against  me  on 
the  part  of  the  poets,  Anytus  of  the  artisans, 
and  Lycon  of  the  orators.  It  would  be  a  wonder 
then,  as  I  remarked  at  the  beginning,  if  in  the 
brief  time  allotted  me  I  should  be  able  to  root 
out  of  your  minds  this  calumny  now  grown  so 
huge.  This  is  the  very  truth,  men  of  Athens, 
and  I  speak  before  you,  nothing  concealing, 
whether  great  or  small,  nothing  dissimulating. 
Yet  I  know  well  enough  that  I  but  increase  the 
hatred  towards  me  by  my  frankness ;  and  this  is 
a  proof,  if  need  be,  that  my  words  are  true, 
and  a  witness  to  the  slander  of  my  life  and  the 
causes  thereof.  Examine  the  matter  now  or 
later  at  your  leisure ;  you  will  find  it  thus. 

And  now  sufficient  has  been  said  in  regard  to 
those  earlier  enemies  and  their  charges;  I  will 
proceed  in  my  defence  against  Meletus — that 
worthy  patriot  as  he  calls  himself — and  my 
recent  accusers.  Let  us  treat  them  as  new 
plaintiffs  and  read  their  affidavit  anew.  So  it 
runs:  Socrates  is  an  evil-doer  and  corrupter  of 


288  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  youth,  who  denies  the  gods  of  the  city,  and 
introduces  strange  daemonic  powers  of  his  own. 
Such  is  the  accusation;  let  us  examine  it  point 
by  point.  It  asserts  that  I  am  an  evil-doer  and 
corrupter  of  the  youth;  but  I,  Athenians,  assert 
that  this  Meletus  is  an  evil-doer;  for  see  how  he 
jests  in  so  serious  an  affair,  thoughtlessly  drag- 
ging men  into  court,  and  affecting  to  be  serious 
and  solicitous  about  matters  for  which  he  never 
cared  a  whit.  No,  I  am  not  misrepresenting 
him,  as  you  shall  see  for  yourselves. 

Now,  Meletus,  speak  up  and  answer  me.     Of 
course  you  are  highly  concerned  that  our  young 
men  shall  turn  out  for  the  best? 
i  am. 

Very  good;  now  inform  these  gentlemen  who 
it  is  improves  them.  You  must  certainly 
know,  since  you  make  this  your  business. 
Having  tracked  down  their  corrupter,  as  you 
say,  you  summon  me  hither  and  lodge  a  com- 
plaint. Now,  then,  speak  out  and  declare  to 
the  court  who  it  is  improves  them.  What, 
Meletus,  you  are  silent  and  have  nothing  to 
say  ?  Yet  is  n't  your  silence  a  little  disgraceful 
now,  and  even  a  good  proof  of  my  taunt  that 
you  do  not  care  a  straw  for  these  things?  Nay, 
tell  us,  my  good  Sir,  who  it  is  improves  them. 

"The  laws." 

I  did  n't  ask  about  them,  my  dear  Sir;  but 
first  of  all,  who  is  the  man  that  knows  the  laws? 


THE  APOLOGY  289 

"The  men  before  you,  Socrates,  the  judges." 

What  's  this  you  say,  Meletus?  Are  these 
men  capable  of  instructing  and  improving  the 
youth  ? 

"So  I  said." 

Do  you  mean  all  of  them,  or  only  part? 

"All  of  them." 

Well  said,  by  the  goddess  Hera,  and  a  mighty 
abundance  of  helpers  for  our  youth!  And 
what  follows  ?  Do  the  gentlemen  of  the  audience 
yonder  improve  them? 

"They  do." 

And  the  senators,^  too? 

"Yes,  and  the  senators." 

Well,  then,  Meletus,  perhaps  those  who  sit 
in  the  great  assembly  corrupt  the  youth;  or  do 
all  of  these,  too,  improve  them? 

"Yes,  these,  too." 

Why,  then,  it  should  seem  that  all  the  Athen- 
ians train  our  young  men  to  be  good  and  honour- 
able— except  me;  I  alone  spread  corruption. 
Is  this  your  meaning? 

"It  is  precisely  what  I  mean." 

Alas,  you  lay  a  great  evil  at  my  door.  But 
tell  me  in  the  case  of  horses,  is  it  your  opinion 
that   all   the  world   can  improve  them,   while 

*  The  senate  was  composed  of  five  hundred  mem- 
bers; its  function  was  judicial  and  executive  as  well 
as  legislative.  There  was  also  an  Ekklesia,  or  assembly 
of  all  free  citizens. 

19 


290  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

only  one  man  injures?  On  the  contrary,  isn't 
it  true  that  one  particular  man,  or  perhaps  some 
few  men,  horse-men  by  profession,  improve 
them,  whereas  most  people  who  meddle  with 
horses  really  spoil  them?  Isn't  this  the  case, 
Meletus,  with  horses  and  all  kinds  of  creatures? 
Indeed  it  is,  no  matter  whether  you  and  Anytus 
say  yes  or  no.  And  it  would  be  a  great  and 
strange  blessing  for  our  youth  if  only  one  man 
spread  corruption  and  all  the  rest  of  the  world 
helped  them.  Really,  Meletus,  you  prove 
sufficiently  well  that  our  young  men  have 
never  given  you  a  care;  and  you  set  forth  your 
own  heedlessness  in  bringing  me  to  court  for 
matters  that  concern  you  not  at  all. 

But  I  am  not  done  with  you,  Meletus.  Tell 
me  whether  it  is  better  to  live  amidst  good  or 
wicked  citizens.  Answer,  I  say,  for  the  question 
is  quite  simple.  Do  not  wicked  citizens  do  ill 
to  their  neighbours,  and  good  citizens  good? 

"Yes,  they  do." 

Would  anybody  in  the  world  wish  to  be 
harmed  by  his  fellow  men  rather  than  benefited  ? 
Answer,  my  friend;  indeed,  the  law  requires 
you  to  answer.  Would  anybody  wish  to  be 
harmed? 

"Of  course  not." 

Well,  then,  do  you  summon  me  hither  because 
I  corrupt  the  youth  and  make  them  wicked 
intentionally  or  against  my  will? 


THE  APOLOGY  29 1 

"Intentionally,  I  say." 

How  is  this,  Meletus?  Are  you  as  a  young 
man  so  much  wiser  than  I  in  my  old  age?  Have 
you  learned  that  the  evil  always  do  ill  to  those 
about  them,  and  the  good,  good,  whereas  I  am 
so  far  gone  in  folly  as  not  to  know  that  if  I  make 
any  one  of  my  fellows  a  rascal  I  am  likely  to 
receive  harm  from  him?  Am  I  so  foolish  as 
to  commit  this  great  wrong  intentionally,  as 
you  say?  I  cannot  accept  your  statement, 
Meletus;  nor  will  any  one  else,  I  think.  Either 
I  do  not  corrupt  the  youth,  or,  if  I  do,  it  is  un- 
wittingly; and  in  either  case  you  are  proved  a 
liar.  If  I  corrupt  them  unwittingly,  then  for 
such  unintentional  errors  you  have  no  authority 
in  law  to  prosecute  me  here ;  but  rather  taking 
me  apart  you  should  instruct  and  admonish  me, 
for  certainly  I  would  turn  from  unwitting  wrong 
were  I  shown  my  error.  Yet  you  have  always 
avoided  me,  never  once  trying  to  enlighten  my 
ignorance,  and  now  you  prosecute  me  before 
this  court  where  those  are  properly  indicted  who 
require  punishment  and  not  enlightenment. 

It  is  now  perfectly  clear,  Athenians,  that 
Meletus,  as  I  said  before,  has  never  troubled 
himself  in  the  least  about  any  of  these  things. 
Yet,  tell  me,  Meletus,  how  is  it  you  say  I  cor- 
rupt the  youth.  Evidently,  according  to  your 
written  indictment,  by  denying  the  gods  of  the 
city  and  introducing  strange  daemonic  powers 


292  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

of  my  own.  Do  you  mean  that  I  corrupt  them 
by  spreading  such  doctrines  as  this? 

"So  I  assert,  and  boldly." 

I  conjure  you,  Meletus,  by  these  very  gods 
who  are  now  in  question,  make  your  charge  a 
little  more  explicit  to  me  and  to  the  court.  I 
do  not  quite  understand.  Do  you  mean  that 
I  teach  the  belief  in  certain  gods,  and  myself 
believe  that  such  exist,  not  being  altogether 
an  atheist  and  evil-doer  in  this  respect,  but 
that  my  gods  are  not  those  of  the  city?  Is  that 
your  charge?  Or  do  you  assert  that  I  utterly 
deny  the  gods  and  spread  abroad  this  doctrine 
of  atheism? 

"I  assert  that  you  absolutely  deny  the  exist- 
ence of  the  gods." 

Extraordinary!  Why  do  you  say  that,  Me- 
letus? Do  not  I,  like  other  men,  believe  the 
sun  and  the  moon  to  be  gods? 

"Hear  him,  judges!  Does  he  not  call  the 
sun  a  stone  and  the  moon  earth?" 

Why,  my  dear  Meletus,  you  must  think  you 
are  accusing  Anaxagoras.  ^     Do  you  so  despise 

1  Anaxagoras  of  Clazomenas,  an  immediate  precursor 
and  possibly  teacher  of  Socrates.  He  dwelt  at  Athens 
for  a  number  of  years  until  expelled  by  the  people  on 
a  charge  of  impiety.  His  remark  on  leaving  Athens 
is  famous:  "It  is  not  I  who  have  lost  the  Athenians 
but  the  Athenians  who  have  lost  me."  He  is  said 
to  have  declared  the  sun  to  be  a  molten  mass,  and  the 


THE  APOLOGY  293 

these  gentlemen,  and  deem  them  so  illiterate 
as  not  to  know  that  the  works  of  Anaxagoras 
the  Clazomenian  are  full  of  such  notions?  And 
of  course  the  young  men  come  to  me  to  learn 
these  doctrines,  when  they  have  plenty  of 
opportunities  of  hearing  them  in  the  theatre 
for  a  drachma  at  most,  and  so  turning  the  laugh 
on  poor  Socrates  if  he  palms  them  off  as  his 
own, — such  outlandish  doctrines,  too.  But, 
in  heaven's  name,  do  you  really  think  me  such 
an  atheist? 

"A  complete  and  utter  atheist." 

Incredible,  Meletus;  you  are  lying  and  you 
know  it. — O  Athenians,  the  man  is  utterly 
insolent  and  wanton;  he  has  made  this  indict- 
ment in  the  merest  insolence  and  wantonness 
and  youthful  bravado.  He  seems  to  have 
patched  together  a  kind  of  riddle  to  try  our  wits, 
as  if  to  say.  Will  the  wise  Socrates  detect  my 
jesting  and  self-contradictions,  or  shall  I  hood- 
wink him  and  the  whole  court?  So  far  as  I  can 
make  out,  he  has  contradicted  himself  flatly  in 
his  own  indictment,  which  as  much  as  says, 
Socrates  is  an  evil-doer  who  does  not  believe  in 

moon  inhabitable  with  hills  and  valleys.  His  most 
characteristic  doctrine  was  the  introduction  of  mind 
into  the  world  as  the  governing  principle.  His  phi- 
losophy was  caricatured  on  the  stage  by  Aristophanes 
and  other  comic  poets,  and  formed  part  of  the  mental 
baggage  of  Euripides. 


294  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  gods,  yet  believes  in  the  gods. — It  is  the 
trick  of  a  jester. 

And  now  let  us  see  why  I  have  such  an  opinion 
of  him.  Do  you,  Meletus,  answer  my  questions; 
and  do  you,  gentlemen,  as  I  requested  at  the 
beginning,  remember  not  to  interrupt  me  if  I 
talk  along  in  my  usual  manner. — Is  there, 
Meletus,  in  all  the  world  a  man  who  recognises 
human  works,  but  denies  that  there  are  men? — 
The  court  sees  that  he  won't  answer,  but  tries 
to  make  a  distraction. — Does  any  one  believe 
there  is  horsemanship,  but  no  horses?  or  flute- 
playing,  but  no  flute-players?  Of  course  not, 
my  honest  friend;  so  much  I  may  affirm  to  you 
and  to  the  others  here,  since  you  are  unready  to 
reply.  But  at  least  answer  me  this:  Does  any 
one  deny  there  are  daemons,  who  yet  acknow- 
ledges their  power? 

"No  one." 

How  delighted  I  am  that  at  last,  compelled  by 
the  court,  you  deign  to  answer.  So,  then,  as 
you  say,  I  do  believe  and  teach  there  are  dae- 
monic powers;  whether  old  or  new  ones  of  my 
own  invention,  no  matter,  for  according  to 
your  words  I  do  believe  in  these  powers,  and 
this  you  have  sworn  to  in  your  affidavit.  But 
if  I  believe  in  daemonic  powers,  I  must  needs 
believe  in  daemons,  must  I  not?  Of  course. 
You  see  I  take  your  silence  for  tacit  agreement. 
And  do  we  not  regard  the  daemons  as  gods  or 


THE  APOLOGY  295 

children   of   the   gods?       Answer   me,    yes   or 
no. 

"Yes." 

Since,  then,  I  acknowledge  there  are  daemons, 
what  riddling  and  jesting  is  this  of  yours?  For 
in  the  one  case  if  the  demons  are  nothing  more 
than  gods,  and  I  believe  in  these  daemons,  why, 
then,  with  one  breath  you  declare  that  I  do  and 
do  not  believe  in  the  gods.  But  if  on  the  other 
hand  these  daemons  are  the  illegitimate  children 
of  the  gods  by  the  nymphs  or  other  mothers,  as 
the  stories  go,  then  who  in  the  world  would  say 
there  are  children  of  the  gods,  but  no  gods? 
Absurd;  you  might  as  well  say  there  are  mules 
from  horses  and  asses,  and  deny  the  existence 
of  horses  and  asses.  The  gist  of  it  all  is  just  this, 
Meletus:  you  have  brought  this  indictment 
against  me  either  to  test  my  wits,  or  else  because 
you  wished  to  accuse  me  and  could  find  no 
real  wrong  to  attack.  But  there  is  no  art  by 
which  you  will  ever  persuade  any  one  not  utterly 
devoid  of  reason  that  the  same  person  can 
believe  in  dasmonic  and  divine  agencies  and  at 
the  same  time  believe  neither  in  daemons  nor 
gods  nor  half -gods— that  is  quite  impossible. 

In  truth,  men  of  Athens,  there  is  no  need 
of  many  words  to  free  myself  from  the  charge 
of  Meletus;  and  sufficient  has  been  said.  But 
as  I  was  saying,  and  as  you  yourselves  know, 
there  are  many  enemies  and  a  deal  of  hatred 


296  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

arrayed  against  me.  It  is  this  will  condemn  me, 
if  I  am  cast;  not  Meletus  or  Anytus,  but  the 
envious  detraction  of  the  multitude  which  has 
condemned  many  an  honest  man  before  me  and 
will  do  the  same  hereafter — there  is  no  danger 
it  will  stop  with  me. 

Possibly  some  one  will  say  here:  But  are 
you  not  ashamed,  Socrates,  to  have  lived  such  a 
life  that  now  you  stand  in  peril  of  death?  I 
might  fairly  reply  to  such  an  one:  You  are 
far  from  the  mark,  my  friend,  if  you  suppose 
that  a  man  of  any  worth  in  the  world  ought  to 
reckon  on  the  chances  of  life  and  death.  Not 
so;  when  he  acts  he  has  only  this  one  thing  to 
consider, — whether  he  acts  righteously  or  un- 
righteously, and  whether  as  a  good  or  a  bad 
man.  Poor  creatures  indeed  your  notion  would 
make  of  the  heroes  who  fell  at  Troy,  and  among 
them  Thetis'  son,  Achilles,  who  so  despised 
danger,  in  comparison  with  dishonour,  that  he 
heeded  not  the  warning  words  of  his  mother, 
though  she  was  a  goddess.  For  so  I  can  imagine 
her  pleading  with  him  in  his  deadly  wrath  against 
Hector,  and  saying:  "O  my  child,  if  you  avenge 
the  death  of  your  comrade  Patroclus  and  slay 
Hector,  you,  too,  must  die; 

Ready  thy  fate  stands  against  thee  after  that  Hector 
hath  fallen." 

Still  when  he  heard  this,  he  accounted  death 


THE  APOLOGY  297 

and  peril  as  but  a  little  thing,  fearing  far  more 
to  live  a  coward  and  leave  his  friends  unavenged. 
"Let  me  perish  straightway,"  he  said,  "and  be 
avenged  of  mine  enemy,  that  I  abide  not  here 
by  the  beaked  ships,  a  laughing-stock  and  a 
burden  of  the  earth." — ^Think  you,  this  man 
cared  for  death  and  peril?  Nay,  Athenians, 
the  truth  is  quite  otherwise ;  for  wherever  a  man 
takes  his  post,  deeming  it  best  for  him  there,  or 
wherever  the  leader  places  him,  there  let  him 
abide,  say  I,  awaiting  danger,  taking  account  of 
naught,  be  it  death  or  any  other  thing,  except 
only  dishonour. 

Strange  indeed  would  my  conduct  be,  men 
of  Athens,  if  I,  who  have  stood  like  many 
another  man  at  my  post  and  faced  death,  when 
the  generals  chosen  by  you  to  command  gave 
me  my  orders, — strange  indeed  if,  now  when 
the  god,  as  I  firmly  believe  and  am  convinced, 
bids  me  stand  forth  as  one  devoted  to  wisdom,  a 
questioner  of  myself  and  all  the  world,  I  were  to 
desert  my  post  through  fear  of  death  or  any 
other  thing.  That  would  be  strange  indeed,  I 
repeat,  and  justly  then  might  a  man  charge  me 
in  court  with  denying  the  gods  if  I  disobeyed 
the  oracle,  and  feared  death,  and  in  my  folly 
deemed  myself  wise.  For  the  fear  of  death,  my 
friends,  is  only  another  form  of  appearing  wise 
when  we  are  foolish  and  of  seeming  to  know 
what   we   know   not.      No  mortal  knoweth   of 


298  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

death  whether  it  be  not  the  greatest  of  all  good 
things  to  man,  yet  do  men  fear  it  as  if  knowing 
it  to  be  the  greatest  of  evils.  And  is  not  this 
that  most  culpable  ignorance  which  pretends 
to  know  what  it  knows  not?  It  may  be,  my 
friends,  that  in  this  I  am  different  from  the 
world ;  and  certainly  if  I  should  claim  to  be  wiser 
than  another  in  any  one  thing,  it  would  be  here- 
in, that  having  no  certain  knowledge  of  the  life 
beyond,  I  pretend  to  none.  Yet  this  know- 
ledge I  have,  and  this  I  know,  that  it  is  an  evil 
and  shameful  thing  to  do  wrong  and  to  disobey 
our  superior,  whether  human  or  divine.  Never, 
then,  will  I  shrink  and  flee  from  what  may  be  an 
unknown  blessing  rather  than  from  evil  known 
to  be  such.  And  therefore  if  now  you  should 
release  me  and  pay  no  heed  to  Anytus,  who 
declares  that  the  trial  should  never  have  been 
admitted  at  all  unless  I  am  to  be  punished  with 
death,  for  otherwise  all  your  sons  will  follow  in 
my  steps  and  be  utterly  corrupted, — ^if  not- 
withstanding this  you  should  say  to  me :  Socrates, 
this  time  we  will  let  you  off  in  spite  of  Anytus, 
but  on  one  condition,  that  you  give  up  this  in- 
vestigation of  yours  and  this  pursuit  of  wisdom, 
under  penalty  of  death  should  you  be  caught  at 
it  again, — if,  I  repeat,  you  were  to  release  me  on 
these  terms,  then  I  should  say  to  you :  O  men  of 
Athens,  I  do  indeed  salute  you  and  wish  you  all 
happiness,  but  I  obey  God  rather  than  you, 


THE  APOLOGY  299 

and  while  there  is  breath  to  me  and  so  far  as  my 
strength  permits,  I  will  not  cease  from  this 
pursuit  of  wisdom,  neither  will  I  desist  from 
admonishing  you.  And  whomsoever  of  you  I 
meet,  with  him  I  will  argue  as  my  wont  is  and 
say  to  him:  My  good  friend,  you  who  belong  to 
Athens,  this  city  great  and  glorious  for  wisdom 
and  power,  are  you  not  ashamed  that  your  life 
is  given  up  to  the  winning  of  much  money  and 
reputation  and  rank,  while  for  wisdom  and  truth 
and  the  good  of  your  own  soul  you  care  not  and 
have  no  concern?  And  if  he  disputes  and 
asserts  his  care  for  these  things,  I  will  not  quickly 
let  him  go  or  leave  him,  but  will  question  and 
examine  him  and  put  him  to  the  proof;  and  if 
then  he  seems  to  claim  a  virtue  which  he  does 
not  possess,  I  will  rebuke  him  because  the  things 
of  most  worth  he  little  esteems,  but  prizes  what 
is  valueless.  In  this  way  I  shall  act  toward 
young  and  old,  whomever  I  meet,  whether 
stranger  or  citizen,  and  especially  toward 
citizens,  as  they  are  closer  akin  to  me.  For 
this,  I  assure  you,  is  the  command  of  the  god; 
and  I  think  no  greater  blessing  has  ever  befallen 
you  in  the  city  than  this  my  service  to  the  god. 
For  I  do  nothing  else  but  go  about  persuading 
you,  young  and  old,  not  to  take  thought  first 
for  your  bodies  and  for  money,  but  more  dili- 
gently to  consider  the  welfare  of  your  own  souls ; 
and  I  say  to  you  always  that  not  from  money 


300  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

proceedeth  virtue,  but  from  virtue  proceed 
money  and  all  good  things  that  men  cherish  in 
public  and  in  private.  If  by  teaching  this 
doctrine  I  corrupt  the  youth,  the  mischief  is 
great;  but  if  any  one  asserts  that  my  teaching 
is  other  than  this,  his  words  are  naught.  There- 
fore I  say  to  you,  Athenians,  yield  to  Anytus 
or  yield  not,  acquit  me  or  acquit  me  not, — 
never  will  I  alter  my  ways,  though  I  suffer 
death  many  times. 

Do  not  cry  out,  Athenians;  but  remember 
how  I  besought  you  to  remain  quiet  and  listen, 
no  matter  what  I  said.  Indeed,  I  think  you 
will  profit  by  hearing.  Now  I  am  going  to  say 
something  else  at  which  perhaps  you  will  raise  a 
shout — yet  I  beg  you  do  not.  Be  assured,  then, 
that  if  I  am  such  an  one  as  I  said  and  you  put 
me  to  death,  you  will  be  doing  yourselves 
greater  harm  than  me.  Neither  Meletus  nor 
Anytus  can  injure  me  a  whit;  there  is  no  power 
in  them  to  do  that;  for  it  is  not  decreed  above 
that  the  better  man  can  be  injured  by  the  worse. 
He  may  inflict  death,  perhaps,  or  exile,  or  civil 
dishonour;  and  possibly  Meletus  and  his  guild 
reckon  these  things  to  be  great  calamities;  but 
I  for  my  part  deem  it  a  far  greater  calamity  to 
plot  unrighteously  against  a  man's  life  as  Meletus 
is  now  doing.  And  therefore,  men  of  Athens, 
I  am  not  concerned  to  plead  for  myself,  as  one 
might  expect  of  me,  but  am  rather  pleading  for 


THE  APOLOGY  301 

you,  lest  by  condemning  me  in  your  ignorance 
you  throw  away  God's  gift  to  you.  For  if  you 
kill  me,  you  will  not  speedily  find  another  like 
me,  sent,  as  it  were,  by  the  hand  of  God  upon 
the  city.  You  will  laugh  at  my  words,  but 
really  this  people  resembles  a  huge  horse, 
thoroughbred,  but  sluggish  from  his  very  size 
and  needing  a  gadfly  to  excite  him.  So  the 
god  seems  to  have  set  me  upon  the  city  as  a 
gadfly,  and  without  respite  I  am  fastening  on 
you  the  livelong  day,  and  exciting  and  urging 
and  reproaching  every  one  I  meet.  Such  an- 
other man  is  not  so  readily  found,  my  friends; 
you  had  better  take  my  advice  and  spare  me. 
Now,  like  a  man  disturbed  in  his  sleep,  you  may 
of  course  fall  into  a  rage  and  crush  me  with  a 
blow,  as  you  would  a  fly — and  so  you  will  please 
Anytus.  After  that  you  may  quietly  slumber 
away  the  rest  of  your  lives,  unless  God  in  his 
mercy  sends  some  other  upon  you.  That  I  am 
really  such  an  one  given  to  the  city  by  God,  you 
may  understand  from  my  life ;  for  it  is  not  from 
merely  human  reasons  that  I  neglect  my  own 
afifairs  and  see  them  going  to  waste  these  many 
years,  while  unweariedly  I  look  to  your  interests 
and  come  to  you  all  individually,  as  if  I  were  a 
father  or  an  elder  brother,  with  my  message  and 
persuasion  of  virtue.  If  I  reaped  any  profit 
from  this  life  or  took  pay  for  my  exhortations, 
it  would  be  a  simple  matter.     My  accusers  have 


302  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

shamelessly  brought  forward  every  other  possible 
charge  against  me;  and  yet,  as  you  yourselves 
see,  they  have  not  dared  to  assert,  under  the 
testimony  of  witnesses,  that  I  ever  exacted  a 
fee  or  asked  any  man  for  such.  I  think,  indeed, 
my  poverty  is  sufficient  evidence  to  the  contrary. 
It  may  perhaps  seem  inconsistent  that  I  go 
about  so  busily  giving  my  advice  in  private,  but 
never  venture  to  come  up  with  you  to  the 
assembly  and  speak  out  before  the  whole  city. 
I  have  a  reason  for  this,  as  you  have  often  heard 
me  explain  and  in  many  places;  for  there  is  a 
certain  divine  or  daemonic  witness  abides  with 
me,  and  it  is  this  that  Meletus  has  caricatured  in 
the  indictment.  From  childhood  it  has  been 
with  me,  as  it  were  a  voice  speaking  at  intervals, 
always  warning  me  against  something  I  had  in 
hand  to  do,  but  never  urging  me  to  act.  This 
it  is  has  restrained  me  from  a  public  life.  And 
wisely  has  it  hindered  me ;  for  doubtless,  Athen- 
ians, if  I  had  busied  myself  with  public  affairs, 
my  death  would  have  fallen  long  before  now, 
and  I  should  have  profited  neither  you  nor  my- 
self. Do  not  chafe  at  hearing  the  truth.  No 
man  will  save  his  own  life  who  boldly  opposes 
you  or  any  other  people  and  checks  the  wicked 
and  lawless  proceedings  in  his  city.  He  who 
would  preserve  his  life  for  a  little  while  to  fight 
the  brave  fight  of  justice  must  seek  his  ends  in 
private  and  not  in  public. 


THE  APOLOGY  303 

I  can  offer  you  convincing  evidence  of  these 
things, — not  in  words,  but  in  what  you  appre- 
ciate, deeds.  Hear  what  actually  befell  me,  and 
you  will  see  that  I  am  not  one  to  yield  the  right 
to  any  man  through  fear  of  death,  but  would 
rather  die  unyielding.  My  story  may  sound 
vulgar  and  commonplace,  but  it  is  at  least  true. 
You  know  I  have  never  held  any  public  office 
in  the  city  except  to  sit  in  the  senate.  Now  it 
happened  that  the  tribe  Antiochis,  to  which  I 
belong,  held  the  presidency  ^  at  the  time  of  the 
battle  of  Arginusae  when  the  ten  generals  were 
charged  with  neglecting  the  bodies  of  the  lost. 
You  remember  you  wished  to  try  them  in  a 
body,  quite  contrary  to  law,  as  you  yourselves 
afterwards  acknowledged.  At  that  time  I  alone 
of  the  presidents  held  out  and  voted  against  this 
illegal  proceeding.  The  demagogues  were  ready 
to  arrest  and  impeach  me;  you  were  urging  them 

» The  senate  was  composed  of  fifty  members  from 
each  of  the  ten  tribes,  each  tribe  in  rotation  holding  the 
presidency,  or  prytaneia,  for  thirty-five  or  thirty-six 
days.  The  prytanes  were  invested  with  certain  execu- 
tive powers,  the  chief  prytanis  of  the  day,  among  other 
things,  presiding  at  the  assembly  of  the  people. — 
After  the  naval  victory  of  Arginusce,  407  e.g.,  the 
generals  failed  to  recover  the  bodies  of  the  dead  and 
drowning,  their  excuse  being  a  violent  storm.  Con- 
trary to  law  and  custom,  they  were  tried  in  a  body, 
instead  of  individually,  before  the  people,  and  con- 
demned to  death. 


304  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

on  and  shouting  out  against  me;  nevertheless  I 
thought  it  behooved  me  to  take  this  hazard 
with  law  and  justice  on  my  side,  rather  than 
stand  with  you  against  justice  through  fear 
of  bonds  or  death.  This  happened  while  the 
people  were  still  in  power;  but  during  the 
Oligarchy  the  thirty  tyrants  1  once  summoned 
me,  with  four  others,  to  the  city  hall,  and  bade 
us  fetch  over  Leon  of  Salamis  from  that  island 
to  be  executed.  Such  commands,  you  know, 
they  were  constantly  giving  in  order  to  implicate 
as  many  as  possible  in  their  crimes.  Then  again 
I  proved,  not  by  words  but  by  deeds,  that  I 
cared  not  a  straw  for  death,  if  I  may  speak  so 
boldly,  but  was  anxious  above  all  else  in  the 
world  to  shun  injustice  and  impiety.  Not  even 
that  strong  and  oppressive  tyranny  could  terrify 
me  into  abetting  injustice.  When  we  came  from 
the  hall  the  other  four  went  to  Salamis  and 
brought  back  Leon,  but  I  went  quietly  home. 
Probably  it  would  have  cost  me  my  life,  had 
not  the  government  of  the  Thirty  fallen  shortly 
afterwards. — ^This  is  my  story  and  there  are 
many  to  bear  witness  to  its  truth. 

>  After  the  fall  of  Athens,  in  404  B.C.,  the  govern- 
ment passed  into  the  hands  of  a  committee  of  thirty 
under  the  connivance  of  Lysander,  the  Spartan  gen- 
eral. Critias,  the  chief  of  these  tyrants,  was  an  uncle 
of  Plato's  and  had  been  a  follower  of  Socrates.  The 
next  year  Thrasybulus  put  an  end  to  this  reign  of 
terror,  and  restored  the  democracy. 


THE  APOLOGY  305 

Now  do  you  suppose  I  could  have  lived 
through  all  these  years  if  I  had  gone  into  public 
affairs,  and  like  an  honest  man  had  made  it  my 
first  duty  always  to  support  the  right?  Far 
from  it,  Athenians;  neither  I  nor  any  other 
could  have  done  it.  Examine  my  whole  life  and 
it  will  appear  that  such  has  been  my  conduct 
wherever  I  have  touched  on  public  affairs. 
And  in  private  I  am  the  same,  for  never  once 
have  I  yielded  to  any  man  in  a  question  of  right 
and  wrong,  no,  not  even  to  one  of  those  who  by 
these  slanderers  are  called  my  disciples.  I  am 
no  master  to  have  disciples.  If  any  one,  young 
or  old,  ever  cares  to  listen  to  me  while  I  talk  and 
go  about  my  business,  I  do  not  repulse  him; 
neither  do  I  discourse  for  money,  but  to  rich 
and  poor  alike  I  offer  myself;  anybody  may 
start  the  question,  and,  if  ready  to  answer  my 
queries,  may  hear  whatever  I  have  to  say. 
And  I  am  in  no  wise  accountable  if  those  who 
listen  to  me  turn  out  good  or  bad,  for  to  none 
of  them  have  I  ever  promised  or  given  any  kind 
of  instruction.  Should  any  one  claim  to  have 
heard  or  learned  from  me  in  private  what  all 
the  world  has  not  heard,  the  man  simply  lies. 

Do  you  ask  why  certain  persons  take  pleas- 
ure in  my  company  year  after  year?  That 
has  already  been  explained  to  you,  Athenians. 
I  told  you  the  whole  truth  when  I  said  their 
pleasure  was  in  hearing  our  pretenders  to  wisdom 
so 


3o6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

detected  in  folly.  There  is  a  certain  satis- 
faction in  this;  but  as  for  me,  my  course  was 
pointed  out  by  God  himself,  whose  admonitions 
came  to  me  in  oracles  and  dreams  and  signs, 
in  whatsoever  way  the  divine  will  is  at  times 
made  manifest  to  men  to  guide  their  actions. 
My  statement,  Athenians,  is  true  and  easily 
proved.  For  if  aforetime  I  corrupted  the  youth 
and  do  still  corrupt  them,  then  some  of  those 
who  have  now  grown  old  enough  to  recognise 
the  evil  counsel  given  them  in  their  youth 
ought  to  come  forward  and  avenge  themselves 
by  denouncing  me.  And  if  they  themselves 
hesitate  to  do  this,  then  their  relatives,  their 
fathers  or  brothers  or  others  of  their  kin,  ought 
to  bear  in  mind  the  dishonour  of  their  family 
and  seek  vengeance.  A  number  of  these  men  I 
see  present  to-day:  yonder  is  Crito,  who  is  of 
the  same  age  and  deme^  with  me;  and  there  is 
his  son  Critobulus ;  then  I  see  Lysanias  of  Sphet- 
tus,  the  father  of  ^Eschines  yonder;  there  is 
Antiphon  of  Cephisus,  the  father  of  Epigenes. 
Others  I  see  whose  brothers  have  been  much 
about  me:  Nicostratus,  the  son  of  Theozotides, 
who  might  speak  for  his  brother  Theodotus,  now 
dead  and  no  longer  able  to  command  his  silence ; 
and   Paralus   yonder,    the   son   of   Demodocus, 

>When,  in  510  b.c,  the  constitution  was  remodelled 
by  Cleisthenes,  the  population  was  divided  for  political 
purposes  into  ten  tribes,  and  each  tribe  into  ten  demes. 


THE  APOLOGY  307 

whose  brother  was  Theages ;  here  is  Adeimantus, 
the  son  of  Ariston,  whose  brother  Plato  is  also 
present;  and  ^Eantodorus,  whose  brother  Apol- 
lodorus  I  likewise  see.  I  might  point  out  a 
number  of  others,  among  whom  Meletus  ought 
certainly  to  have  found  some  one  to  produce  as 
a  witness  during  his  speech.  Perhaps  he  forgot 
while  speaking:  let  him  bring  forward  his 
witnesses  now — I  yield  the  floor — ^let  him  say  if 
he  has  any  such  testimony.  No,  Athenians, 
you  will  find,  on  the  contrary,  they  are  all  ready 
to  witness  for  me,  for  me  the  corrupter  and 
destroyer  of  their  families,  if  you  are  to  believe 
Meletus  and  Anytus.  No  doubt  those  whom  I 
actually  corrupted  may  have  their  grounds 
for  supporting  me;  but  the  uncorrupted,  these 
older  men,  their  relatives,  what  other  reason 
can  they  have  for  abetting  me  but  the  plain 
and  straightforward  reason  of  justice?  They 
know,  forsooth,  that  Meletus  lies  and  that  I 
speak  the  truth. 

Well,  gentlemen,  this  and  the  like  of  this 
is  about  all  I  have  to  offer  as  an  apology.  Yet 
there  may  be  some  one  among  you  who  will  be 
indignant  when  he  recalls  his  own  conduct  on 
such  an  occasion.  He  may  have  had  less  at 
stake  than  I,  yet  with  many  tears  he  implored 
and  supplicated  the  judges,  dragging  his  little 
children  before  the  court  and  a  swarm  of  friends 
and  relatives  to  awaken  pity;  whereas  I  will 


3o8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

do  nothing  of  the  sort,  although  my  danger,  it 
might  seem,  is  the  extremest  of  all.  Such  an 
one,  observing  my  conduct,  may  harden  himself 
against  me  and  suffer  anger  to  influence  his  vote. 
If  any  one  is  so  disposed — but  that  is  scarcely 
possible— still  if  there  be  any  such,  I  might 
fittingly  say  to  him:  My  dear  friend,  I,  too, 
have  my  family  ties;  I,  too,  as  Homer  says,  was 
born  of  human  parents,  and  not  of  a  stock  or  a 
stone;  I  have  my  own  kith  and  kin,  and  even 
children,  three  sons,  Athenians,  one  a  grown 
boy  and  the  other  two  quite  young.  But  I  will 
drag  none  of  these  hither  and  so  beseech  you  to 
release  me.  You  ask  my  reasons  for  refusing? 
Not  out  of  wilfulness,  gentlemen,  or  because  I 
contemn  you;  and  whether  I  hold  death  lightly 
or  not  is  another  question.  The  point  is  that 
out  of  regard  for  myself  and  for  you  and  for  the 
whole  city  I  deem  it  degrading  to  stoop  to  any 
such  means.  For  I  am  now  an  old  man  and 
have,  whether  rightly  or  wrongly,  acquired  a 
certain  name, — yes,  the  saying  has  gone  abroad 
that  Socrates  is  different  from  the  rest  of  the 
world.  It  is  a  shameful  thing,  if  those  among 
you  who  are  held  superior  for  wisdom  or  courage 
or  some  other  virtue  are  willing  to  act  in  this 
way.  Indeed,  I  have  more  than  once  seen  men 
of  reputation  behave  in  the  strangest  fashion 
when  on  trial;  one  might  suppose  they  looked 
on  death  as  a  monstrous  ill,  just  as  though  they 


THE  APOLOGY  309 

were  to  be  immortal  if  once  they  escaped  your 
hands.  Such  men,  I  say,  are  an  opprobrium  to 
the  city;  they  leave  any  foreigner  to  remark  of 
us,  that  the  best  of  Athenians  in  virtue,  the 
men  chosen  by  the  Athenians  for  place  and 
honour,  are  in  reality  no  better  than  women. 
O  men  of  Athens,  we  who  have  a  name  among 
you  ought  not  to  behave  thus,  nor,  if  we  would, 
ought  you  to  allow  it.  You  ought  clearly  to 
show  that  condemnation  inevitably  falls,  not 
on  the  man  who  keeps  his  peace,  but  on  those 
who  go  through  these  piteous  farces  and  render 
the  city  ridiculous. 

And  apart  from  appearances,  O  Athenians, 
it  does  not  seem  right  to  appeal  to  the  sympathy 
of  the  judges  and  escape  by  such  means,  but 
rather  to  inform  and  convince  them.  The 
judge  does  not  sit  here  to  grant  justice  as  a 
favour,  but  to  decide  the  truth ;  he  is  under  oath 
to  give  judgment  in  accordance  with  the  laws 
and  to  show  partiality  to  none.  Is  it  your  wish 
that  we  should  encourage  perjury  amongst  you? 
and  how,  then,  shall  you  and  we  escape  the  evil 
of  impiety?  Do  not  therefore  require  of  me, 
Athenians,  to  demean  myself  before  you  in  a 
manner  that  I  consider  neither  honourable  nor 
right  in  the  eyes  of  God  and  men,  and  especially 
now  when  I  am  charged  by  Meletus  here  with 
the  very  crime  of  impiety.  For  clearly  were  I 
to  persuade  you  and  force  you  by  my  supplica- 


3IO  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

tions  to  forswear  yourselves,  clearly,  then,  I 
should  be  teaching  you  to  disbelieve  in  the  gods; 
and  in  the  very  act  of  my  apology  I  should  be 
accusing  myself  of  atheism.  But  such  disbelief 
is  far  from  my  thoughts,  Athenians;  I  do  believe, 
though  my  belief  is  beyond  the  understanding 
of  my  accusers.  And  now  I  commit  myself  to 
you  and  to  God,  to  judge  as  it  shall  be  best  for 
me  and  for  you. 

[Socrates  is  condemned  by  a  majority  of,  perhaps,  280  to 
220. — He  now  discusses  the  penalty  to  he  inflicted.  Ac- 
cording to  the  custom  of  the  Athenian  courts,  prosecutor 
and  defendant  each  proposed  a  penalty,  and  it  was  left 
to  the  judges  to  decide  between  these  two.  Meletus  has 
proposed  the  death-penalty.'] 

There  are  many  reasons,  men  of  Athens,  why 
I  am  not  troubled  that  the  verdict  has  gone 
against  me.  Indeed,  the  result  was  fully  ex- 
pected, and  I  am  only  surprised  at  the  closeness 
of  the  vote.  I  thought  to  be  condemned  by  a 
large  majority,  and  now  it  appears  that  only 
thirty  votes  were  needed  to  acquit  me.  So  far 
as  Meletus  is  concerned,  I  have,  I  think,  escaped, 
and  more  than  escaped ;  for  it  must  be  apparent 
to  all  that  if  Anytus  and  Lycon  had  not  taken 
part  in  the  accusation  he  would  have  fallen 
below  one  fifth  of  the  votes  and  so  forfeited  the 
thousand  drachmas.^ 

'  Any  prosecutor  in  a  criminal  suit  who  failed  to  get 
one  ££th  of  the  votes  was  subject  to  this  fine. 


THE  APOLOGY  31I 

The  man  has  proposed  death  as  the  penalty. 
Very  good;  and  what  counter-penalty  shall  I 
propose?  Evidently  what  I  deserve.  And  what 
is  that?  what  do  I  deserve  to  suffer  or  pay? 
Look  at  me :  never  in  all  my  life  have  I  learned  to 
be  idle;  for  a  higher  end  I  have  neglected  all 
that  the  world  most  covets, — wealth,  property, 
military  command,  public  leadership,  office, 
the  influence  of  party  and  faction  in  the  State, — 
regarding  myself  as  too  honest  a  man  to  indulge 
in  these  pursuits  and  save  my  own  life.  Neither 
did  I  see  any  profit  in  these  things  to  you  or 
to  myself,  and  therefore  I  passed  them  by  and 
took  up  a  new  pursuit.  Going  to  each  of  you  in 
private,  I  conferred  on  him  what  I  call  the  high- 
est benefit  in  the  world,  by  persuading  him  to 
think  first  of  the  good  of  his  own  real  self  and 
afterwards  of  his  material  affairs;  to  think  first 
of  the  good  of  the  city  itself  and  afterw^ards  of 
her  interests,  and  so  in  all  things.  You  see 
what  man  I  am;  what  should  be  done  to  me? 
Some  good  thing,  Athenians,  if  I  am  to  propose 
what  I  really  deserve, — and  some  good  thing 
that  shall  be  suited  to  me.  What,  then,  is 
suited  to  a  poor  man,  your  benefactor,  who  only 
demands  leisure  to  go  on  admonishing  you? 
There  is  no  other  reward  so  appropriate  as  a 
seat  at  the  tables  in  the  Prytaneum.  ^     This  he 

» Where  certain  officials,  guests  of  the  state,  victors 
at  the  games,  and  others  ate  at  the  public  expense. 


312  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

deserves  more  than  any  of  your  victors  with 
horse  or  chariot  at  the  Olympic  games ;  for  these 
champions  give  you  but  the  name  of  fortunate, 
whereas  I  render  you  such  in  reality.  More- 
over they  need  no  support,  and  I  do.  Therefore 
if  I  must  propose  the  proper  and  just  reward, 
my  proposition  is  a  seat  at  the  tables  in  the 
Prytaneum. 

Possibly  I  may  seem  to  you  now  to  be  speak- 
ing with  the  same  arrogance  as  before  in  the 
matter  of  tears  and  supplications.  That  is  not 
the  case ;  rather  I  am  persuaded  that  never  once 
have  I  willingly  wronged  a  human  being,  how- 
ever I  fail  to  convince  you  of  the  fact.  A  little 
while  only  we  have  talked  here  one  with  an- 
other; and  I  think  you,  too,  might  be  convinced 
if  your  custom  permitted  us  to  discuss  the 
sentence  of  death,  not  for  one  day  only,  but 
for  several  days,  as  other  States  do.  Now  it  is 
not  easy  in  this  brief  time  to  root  out  deep- 
seated  prejudices.  Being  persuaded,  then,  that 
I  have  never  wronged  any  man,  I  am  not  likely 
now  to  wrong  myself,  or  say  of  myself  that  I 
deserve  any  evil,  or  pronounce  any  such  sentence 
upon  myself.  And  why  should  I?  Through 
fear  of  the  penalty  proposed  by  Meletus?  But 
as  I  have  already  stated,  I  do  not  know  whether 
death  is  really  a  blessing  or  an  evil.  And 
instead  of  this  shall  I  name  some  penalty  which 
I  know  to  be  an  evil?  imprisonment,  for  example? 


THE  APOLOGY  313 

Why  should  I  pass  my  life  in  prison,  the  slave 
of  each  succeeding  officer?  Shall  I  propose  a 
fine,  with  imprisonment  until  the  sum  is  paid? 
But  in  my  case  that  would  be  confinement  for 
life,  as  I  have  no  money  to  pay  withal.  Or  exile, 
perhaps?  It  is  quite  probable  you  would  agree 
to  that.  But  what  a  poor  spirit  mine  would  be, 
what  blindness  of  heart,  if  I  supposed  that  any 
other  people  would  put  up  with  me  when  you, 
my  fellow  citizens,  find  my  continual  discoursing*^ 
and  arguing  so  intolerably  odious  that  you  must 
needs  get  rid  of  me.  My  blindness  is  not  so 
great,  Athenians.  It  would  be  a  noble  life  for 
me  in  my  old  age  to  go  forth  an  exile  and  be 
bandied  about  from  city  to  city.  Well  I  know 
that  wherever  I  went  the  young  men  would  flock 
to  hear  my  words  just  as  they  do  here.  If  I 
drove  them  away,  they  themselves  would  call 
upon  the  elders  to  banish  me;  and  if  I  suffered 
them  to  follow  me,  then  in  fear  for  them  their 
fathers  and  kinsmen  would  banish  me. 

Does  any  one  ask,  Why  can't  you  withdraw 
somewhere,  Socrates,  and  live  in  silence  and 
peace?  It  seems  strangely  difficult  to  enlighten 
you  on  this  point.  If  I  say  I  cannot  hold  my 
peace  because  this  would  be  to  disobey  the  god, 
you  will  take  my  words  in  jest.  If  on  the  other 
hand  I  say  that  the  one  good  thing  in  all  the 
world  for  a  man  is  to  pass  his  days  in  converse 
about  virtue  and  these  other  matters  whereof  I 


314  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

am  continually  talking  and  questioning  myself 
and  others,  and  that  a  life  unquestioned  is  no  life 
at  all  for  a  man, — if  I  say  this,  you  will  believe 
me  even  less.  Nevertheless  I  speak  truly,  though 
you  are  slow  to  believe.  And  further,  I  am  not 
accustomed  to  think  of  myself  as  deserving 
punishment.  Had  I  money,  I  should  propose  a 
fine,  the  greatest  I  could  pay,  and  account  it  no 
evil.  But  this  cannot  be,  unless  you  accept  a 
sum  within  my  scant  means.  For  example,  I 
might  perhaps  pay  a  silver  mina ;  and  this  fine  I 
will  propose.  Plato  here,  O  Athenians,  and 
Crito  and  Critobulus  and  Apollodorus  bid  me 
name  thirty  minae,  and  offer  themselves  as 
security.  This  sum,  therefore,  I  finally  propose, 
and  these  men  will  be  sufficient  security  to  you 
for  the  payment. 

[He  is  condemned  to  death.] 

You  have  gained  but  a  little,  Athenians,  and 
at  how  great  a  cost!  From  those  who  are 
prompt  to  revile  our  city  you  will  receive  the 
name  and  opprobrium  of  killing  Socrates,  a 
man  of  wisdom, — for  in  their  eagerness  to  blame 
you  they  will  call  me  wise  whether  I  am  so  or 
not.  Could  you  have  waited  but  a  little  while, 
the  event  would  have  come  of  itself.  My  age 
is  not  hidden;  you  see  that  I  am  far  on  in  life 
and  near  to  death.  I  am  not  speaking  now  to 
all,  but  to  those  of  you  who  voted  my  death. 


THE  APOLOGY  315 

And    to   them    I    say   further:     You    suppose, 
gentlemen,  that  I  have  lost  through  lack  of  words 
to  convince  you,  even  provided  I  had  stooped  to 
say  and  do  anything  to  escape.     Not  so.     I  am 
cast,  not  through  lack  of  words,  but  through 
lack    of    impudence    and    shamelessness,    and 
because  I  would  not  speak  what  you  are  most 
pleased  to  hear,  nor  weep  and  wail,  nor  do  and 
say  a  thousand  other  degrading  things  which 
others  have  taught  you  to  expect.     At  the  time 
it  did  not  seem  worth  while  to  demean  myself 
as  a  slave  through  fear ;  neither  do  I  now  repent 
of  my  manner  of  defence.     I  choose  to  defend 
myself  thus  and  die,  rather  than  as  you  would 
have  me  and  live.     Neither  in  war  nor  in  a 
lawsuit  ought  a  man,  neither  I  nor  any  other, 
to  accept  every  means  of  avoiding  death.     In 
battle,  for  instance,  a  man  often  sees  that  he 
may  save  his  life  by   throwing   away  his  arms 
and  falling  in  supplication  before  his  pursuers; 
and  so  in  all  times  of  peril  there  are  ways  of 
escape  if  one  will  submit  to  any  baseness.     Nay, 
Athenians,  it  is  not  so  hard  to  shun  death,  but 
hard   indeed   to   shun   evil,    for   it   runs   more 
swiftly  than  death.     I,  you  see,  an  old  man  and 
slow  of  gait,  have  been  overtaken  by  the  slower 
runner;  whereas  my  accusers,  who  are  young 
and  nimble,  are  caught  by  the  swifter  runner, 
which    is    wickedness.     And    now    I    go    away 
condemned  by  you  to  death,  but  they  depart 


3l6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

hence  condemned  by  truth  herself  to  injustice 
and  sin,  I  abide  by  my  award,  and  they  by 
theirs.  Some  fate,  it  may  be,  has  meted  out 
the  awards,  and  I  at  least  am  content. 

And  now  a  word  of  prophecy  for  those  who 
condemned  me;  for  I  stand  at  the  threshold  of 
death,  when,  if  ever,  men  speak  with  prophetic 
insight.  So  I  say  to  you  who  have  slain  me  that 
straightway  after  my  death  a  punishment  shall 
come  upon  you  far  more  terrible,  God  knows, 
than  your  slaying  me.  You  have  committed 
this  crime,  thinking  to  shake  off  the  burden  of 
accounting  for  your  lives;  but  the  result,  I  tell 
you  now,  will  be  quite  the  contrary.  There 
are  many  who  will  call  you  to  account, — men 
whom  I  have  restrained  and  whom  you  have 
never  suspected;  younger  men  who  will  attack 
you  more  savagely  and  cause  you  still  greater 
annoyance.  You  are  wide  of  the  mark  if  you 
hope  by  executions  to  silence  all  censures  of  your 
evil  conduct.  That  way  of  escape  is  neither 
very  effective  nor  very  honourable.  But  there 
is  another  way  easier  and  far  more  noble:  do 
not  crush  others,  but  look  to  the  bettering  of 
your  own  lives.  I  have  made  my  prophecy, 
and  have  done  with  you  who  condemned  me. 

And  last  with  those  who  voted  for  my  acquittal 
I  would  talk  over  this  event,  while  the  authori- 
ties are  busy,  and  before  I  go  thither  where  I 
must  die.     Remain  with  me  that  little  while. 


THE  APOLOGY  317 

my  friends.  There  is  nothing  to  hinder  our 
talking  together  until  I  go;  and  I  wish  to  point 
out  to  you,  as  my  well-wishers,  the  significance 
of  what  has  happened  to  me.  A  wonderful 
thing,  O  judges, — for  you  I  may  rightly  call 
judges, — a  wonderful  thing  has  befallen  me. 
Constantly  before  this  the  wonted  sign,  the 
warning  voice  of  the  daemon,  has  come  to  me 
and  opposed  me  in  the  most  trivial  affairs  if  I 
chanced  to  be  going  wrong.  And  now  you  see 
what  has  befallen  me,  this  calamity  which 
might  be  called  the  greatest  of  all  evils;  yet 
neither  this  morning  when  I  left  my  house,  nor 
when  I  came  up  here  to  the  court,  nor  during  the 
whole  course  of  my  speech, — not  once  has  the 
divine  warning  deterred  me.  And  this  is 
remarkable,  for  often  on  other  occasions  the 
sign  has  stopped  me  short  in  the  very  midst  of 
what  I  was  saying.  But  now  through  this  whole 
affair  it  has  not  once  opposed  me  in  what  I  have 
done  or  said.  You  ask  how  I  interpret  this? 
I  will  tell  you.  It  indicates  that  everything  has 
happened  for  my  good,  and  that  those  of  us  who 
think  it  an  evil  to  die  are  quite  wrong  in  our 
notion.  It  must  be  so;  the  accustomed  sign 
would  have  warned  me,  had  I  not  been  in  the 
way  of  good. 

But  we  have  other  reasons  for  hoping  con- 
fidently that  death  is  a  blessing.  Consider  a 
moment.     To  die  must  be  one  of  two  things: 


3l8  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

either  the  dead  are  as  nothing  and  have  no 
perception  or  feeling   whatsoever,   or   else,    as 
many  believe,  there  is  a  change  and  migration  of 
the  soul  from  this  world  to  another.     If,  now, 
there  is  no  consciousness  in  the  grave,  but  deep 
sleep,  as  when  a  man  in  slumber  discerns  not 
even  a  dream,  then  will  death  be  a  marvellous 
gain.     For  consider   such   a  night   of   slumber 
when  we  behold  not  the   shadow   of  a  dream; 
compare  all  the  other  days  and  nights  of  our 
life  with  such  a  night,  and  ask  ourselves  how 
many  of  them  could  be  called  happier  than  this 
night  of  deep  sleep ;  we  should  find  them  in  the 
course  of  a   long   life  but  few  in  number  and 
easily  counted ;  and  this  I  believe  will  hold  good, 
not  only  of  us  poor  mortals,  but   of  the  great 
King  of  Persia  himself.     If  death  is  like  this, 
I  at   least  reckon  it  a  gain,  and  endless  time 
will  seem  no  more  than  a  single  night.     But  if 
death  is,  as  it  were,  a  journeying  hence  to  an- 
other world,  where,  as  men  believe,  the  departed 
dead    dwell    together, — ^what    greater    blessing 
than  this  could  you  desire,  my  judges?     Will 
not  that  be  a  wonderful  journey,  if,  escaping 
these  self-styled  judges,   we  go  to  that  other 
world  and  stand  there  before  those  true  judges, 
as  the  saying  is,  Minos  and  Rhadamanthys  and 
JEacus    and    Triptolemus,    and   others   of   the 
half-gods    who    lived    righteously    in    this   life? 
Would  any  of  you  count  it  a  little  thing  to  meet 


THE  APOLOGY  319 

Orpheus  and  Musaeus  and  Hesiod  and  Homer, 
and  talk  with  them?  I  am  ready  to  die  many 
times  if  this  belief  is  true.  That  would  be  a 
glorious  life  for  me  there  where  I  might  meet 
Palamedes,  and  Ajax  the  son  of  Telamon,  and 
others  perhaps  who  long  ago  perished  by  an 
unrighteous  judgment;  and  how  glad  I  should  be 
to  compare  my  wrongs  with  theirs.  But  the 
greatest  joy  would  be  in  questioning  the  inhabit- 
ants there  as  I  do  here,  and  examining  them  to 
discover  who  is  really  wise  and  who  only  in  his 
own  conceit.  What  would  not  a  man  give,  O 
judges,  to  examine  the  leader  of  the  great  Tro- 
jan armament,  or  Odysseus,  or  Sisyphus,  or 
any  of  a  thousand  other  men  and  women  whom 
it  would  be  our  infinite  joy  to  meet  and  question 
and  call  our  friends.  Assuredly  they  of  that 
world  do  not  put  men  to  death  for  doing  this. 
They  are  altogether  happier  there  than  we, 
happier  and  deathless  forever  more,  if  the  say- 
ing be  true. 

And  ye  too,  my  judges,  ought  to  be  of  good 
hope  toward  death,  being  persuaded  of  this  one 
thing  at  least,  that  no  evil  can  befall  a  good  man 
either  in  life  or  in  death,  and  that  his  affairs  are 
all  in  the  hands  of  God.  Neither  have  these 
events  befallen  by  chance,  but  I  see  clearly  it 
was  better  for  me  to  die  and  be  released  from 
this  labour  of  life.  Therefore  not  once  in  my 
trial  was  a  sign  given  to  turn  me  aside,  and 


320  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

therefore  I  feel  little  anger  toward  those  who 
accused  and  condemned  me.  Yet  because  they 
did  not  accuse  and  condemn  me  in  this  mind,  but 
thinking  to  do  me  harm,  for  this  they  are  worthy 
of  blame.  And  I  may  make  of  them  this  one 
request :  When  my  sons  have  grown  up,  I  would 
ask  you,  gentlemen,  to  worry  them  as  I  have 
worried  you,  if  they  seem  to  care  more  for 
money  and  such  things  than  for  virtue,  and  if 
they  claim  to  be  something  when  they  are 
naught.  Do  you  rebuke  them  as  I  have  re- 
buked you  for  not  caring  about  what  they  should, 
and  for  thinking  themselves  something  when 
they  are  of  nothing  worth.  If  you  do  this,  both 
I  and  my  sons  shall  have  received  justice  at 
your  hands.— And  now  it  is  time  to  depart 
hence,  I  to  die  and  you  to  live;  but  which  of  us 
goes  to  the  better  fate  no  one  knoweth  save 
only  God. 


PLATO 

The  simplicity  of  the  religious  instinct,  I 
have  sometimes  feared,  may  have  been  ob- 
scured in  these  studies  and  unduly  complicated 
by  the  manifold  interests  of  the  living  characters 
through  which  it  has  been  voiced.  That  in- 
stinct, when  stripped  of  the  increments  of  reason 
and  the  imagination,  was  found  in  the  bare 
consciousness  of  a  dual  tendency  in  human  na- 
ture. The  cause  and  correspondences  of  that 
dualism  we  may  not  comprehend;  we  know 
only  that  it  is  for  us,  not  an  idle  specula- 
tion or  a  curious  dream,  but  the  vital  truth. 
In  one  direction  we  tend  toward  unity  and  the 
absorption  of  separate  desires  and  energies  in 
the  knowledge  of  our  own  completeness.  The 
sense  of  ourself  as  a  being  different  in  compos- 
ition from  other  beings  is  lost  in  the  recognition 
of  a  higher  Self  which  leaves  no  room  for  the 
antagonism  of  individualities;  and  the  following 
of  that  ideal  we  call  the  spiritual  as  opposed  to 
the  material  life.  As  the  goal  of  this  tendency 
we  speak  of  an  eternal  changelessness,  of  a  self- 
sufficient  joy,   and  of  infinite  life — ^unmeaning 

30  321 


322  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

words  if  passed  through  the  analysing  intelli- 
gence, but  to  the  foresight  of  experience,  nay, 
to  the  remembrance  of  those  who  at  moments 
have  risen  to  the  heights  of  contemplation,  the 
great  reality  without  which  one  half  of  our 
nature  is  left  halt  and  impotent.  In  the  other 
direction  lies  the  sense  of  our  personality  as 
concerned  with  variety  and  change  and  that 
world  of  phenomena,  which  is  a  reflection,  it 
may  be  (who  shall  say?),  of  a  dissipation  within 
ourselves.  In  this  way  we  come  to  distractions 
and  restlessness,  to  self-seeking,  competition, 
envy,  jealousy,  and  strifes;  to  misery,  devouring 
egotism,  lust,  and  violence.  Its  end  is  despair 
and  the  irreparable  decomposition  of  death. 

In  its  philosophical  form  this  difference  of 
direction  shows  itself  as  the  antinomy  of  the 
one  and  the  many.  On  the  side  of  the  one 
reason  and  the  imagination,  acting  as  independ- 
ent faculties,  are  fain  to  set  up  an  imitative 
unity  of  visible  nature,  beautiful  in  its  fancied 
harmony  and  alluring  to  the  moral  sense,  but 
perilous  as  a  narcotic  to  spiritual  discontent. 
Or,  more  commonly,  they  ally  themselves  with 
this  very  discontent,  expressing  it  in  myths  and 
dogmas  which  are  imposed  upon  the  heart  as 
the  absolute  verity  of  religion.  It  has  thus 
seemed,  and  to  some  it  still  seems,  that  he  who 
questions  the  fabric  of  Christianity  denies  thereby 
the  validity  of  the  religious  instinct  itself.   On  the 


PLATO  323 

Other  side  these  faculties,  accepting  the  many,  are 
often  able  to  disguise  its  endless  disintegration 
by  a  specious  combination  of  interests:  egotism, 
put  ofE  its  guard,  talks  the  language  of  sympathy ; 
the  solitude  of  the  individual  is  forgotten  in 
the  complexity  of  influences  which  we  call  the 
solidarity  of  the  race ;  the  pang  of  incompleteness 
is  assuaged  by  dominion  over  others.  In  this 
sphere  move  the  activities  and  ambitions  and 
honours  and  satisfactions  of  the  world.  But 
always  to  one  who  rests  in  these  half-way  houses 
of  the  reason  and  the  imagination  there  clings 
the  haunting  and  at  times  terrifying  conscious- 
ness of  the  reality  of  that  dualism  between 
whose  immeasurably  remote  goals  he  hangs  in 
trembling  suspense. 

Not  the  least  advantage  of  what  we  call  Pla- 
tonism  is  that  it  was  conceived  among  a  people 
who  had  never  passed  under  the  yoke  of  a 
tyrannical  priesthood  or  submitted  to  the 
bondage  of  an  infallible  bible.  The  higher 
theogony  among  them,  as  the  evocation  of  the 
poets,  and  superstition,  as  the  work  of  the  ig- 
norant masses,  were  readily  seen  to  be  a  distinct 
product  of  the  fancy;  and  we  may  plausibly 
look  forward  to  a  period  when  this  very  absence 
of  dogmatic  authority  will  save  the  mythology 
of  Greece  from  that  utter  condemnation  which 
threatens  to  overtake  more  exacting  and,  it  may 
be,  more  spiritual  creeds.     It  is  possible  that 


324  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Zeus  and  Apollo,  the  nymphs  and  dryads,  may 
retain  their  appeal  as  symbols  of  the  religious 
imagination,  when  Jehovah  and  Jesus,  Allah  and 
Mahomet,  have  been  dethroned  as  false  gods 
and  denounced  as  priestly  impositions. 

Certainly  this  comparative  freedom  from  a 
formal  orthodoxy  made  it  easier  for  the  Greek 
philosopher  to  deal  with  religion  apart  from  its 
common  accessories.  I  would  not  say  that 
Plato  escaped  altogether  the  ephemeral  influ- 
ences of  his  age  and  the  limitations  of  the  in- 
dividual mind.  There  are  passages  in  his  works 
which  have  lost  their  meaning  because  based  on 
the  theorems  of  an  imperfect  science.  Now 
and  then  he  makes  concessions  to  popular 
superstition,  nor  could  he  avoid  turning  his 
imperial  imagination  to  the  erection  of  a  gor- 
geous but  futile  mythology  of  his  own.  No 
one  will  complain  of  those  fables  in  which  he 
threw  the  transparent  web  of  fancy  over  the 
mystery  of  man's  future  life;  here  he  employed 
the  legitimate  instrument  of  the  philosophical 
poet.  It  is  another  guess  matter  when  in  an 
elaborate  dialogue  like  the  TimcBUS  he  under- 
takes to  transfer  the  known  dualism  of  man's 
nature  to  a  definite  theory  of  the  universe. 
Much  in  that  discourse  may  have  value  as  a 
sublime  allegory  of  our  inner  experience,  but 
it  is,  to  say  the  least,  a  dangerous  tampering 
with  veracity  to  present  this  experience  dog- 


PLATO  325 

matically  as  the  story  of  creation,  with  the 
fiction  of  a  changeless  God  working  upon  a 
material  chaos  through  the  mediation  of  his 
demiurgic  offspring.  Here  he  is  a  traitor  to 
the  divine  abstinence  of  his  master.  We  know 
and  we  know  not;  and  the  Socratic  interpre- 
tation of  the  oracular  crown  of  wisdom  as  a 
reward  for  distinguishing  between  knowledge  of 
self  and  ignorance  of  the  world,  like  the  Indian's 
vidyd  and  avidyd,  might  have  saved  him  from 
this  presumption  of  the  prophets.  It  might 
also  have  warned  him  from  the  folly  of  the  meta- 
physicians, in  such  barren  efforts  to  deal  caus- 
ally with  the  infinite  and  the  finite  as  fill  the 
Philebus  and  the  Parmenides. 

But  these  divagations  are  merely  the  out- 
works of  a  system  which  is  at  heart  thoroughly 
human,  and  they  have  their  value,  perhaps, 
as  rounding  out  that  system  so  as  to  meet  all  the 
needs  of  man's  importunate  intellect.  Within 
these  concessions  to  mythology  and  rational- 
ism resides  the  kernel  of  his  philosophy,  answer- 
ing to  the  endless  aspiration  of  the  spirit  of 
man  and  setting  forth  dualism  as  the  incontro- 
vertible fact  of  our  being.  Above  all  he  was  pre- 
served from  the  seductions  of  his  own  mind  by 
the  dramatic  impulse  which  led  him  at  first  to 
offer  his  arguments  as  an  exposition  of  the 
character  of  his  master,  and  which  to  the  end 
kept  him  from  altogether  subordinating  concrete 


326  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

life  to  theory.     It  was    something   more  than 
modesty  or  loyalty  that  made  Plato  put  all  his 
philosophy,  even  when  it  far  transgressed  his 
master's   ideas,    into    the    form    of    discussions 
between  Socrates  and  the  inquiring  youths  or 
sophisticated  doubters  of  Athens;  it  was  from 
an  instinctive  feeling  that  reason  when  severed 
from  the  other  faculties  is  a  dangerous  guide. 
In  the  early  dialogues  which  tell  the  story  of 
Socrates'  trial  and  death  we  have  the  perfect 
record, — clearer,    I    am   constrained    to   think, 
and  less  mixed  with  dubious  elements  than  the 
Gospels, — of    the    religious    sense    in    practice. 
There  it  is  shown  how  the  daemonic  witness  which 
through  life  had  warned  Socrates  against  vicious 
or  compromising  acts  was  the  voice  of  faith  bid- 
ding him   always   turn   from  his  lower  to  his 
higher  nature ;  how  the  uncomplaining  submis- 
sion of  Socrates  to   the  laws,   even   while   he 
knew  himself  above  their  reach,—  like  the  duty 
imposed  upon  Arjuna  in  the  field  of  battle,— 
was  the  test  of  faith  by  morality ;  and  how  his 
inviolable  serenity  under  the  judgment  of  the 
world,  together  with  his  absence  of  animosity 
against  the  judges,  was  the  assurance  that  his 
morality  sprang  from  victory  over  himself.   Those 
who,  intent  upon  the  abstruser  problems  of  Plato, 
neglect  the  biographical  message  of  the  Apology 
and  the  Crito  and  the  closing  scene  of  the  PhcBdo, 
have  missed  the  heart  of  his  doctrine.     I  am 


PLATO  327 

not  sure  but  the  brief  and  inconclusive  dialogue 
between  Socrates  and  the  youthful  Euthyphro, 
as  they  debate  the  question  of  impiety  so  soon 
to  be  settled  for  them  by  the  courts,  has  more 
depth  of  meaning  for  one  who  understands 
than  all  the  discursive  theorising  of  the  Laws. 

We  know  in  what  way  Socrates  discussed 
the  new  philosophy  in  the  market  place  and 
shops  of  Athens,  in  the  streets  of  the  city  and 
even  in  the  grassy  valley  of  the  Ilissus  without 
the  walls — ^wherever  he  could  find  men  to  en- 
dure his  insinuating  questions.  No  such  ac- 
count has  come  down  to  us  of  the  manner  of 
Plato's  teaching,  but  it  is  a  fair  conjecture  to 
suppose  that  in  his  more  formal  instruction  he 
did  not  entirely  abandon  the  social  method  of 
his  master.  One  likes  to  believe  that  his  talks 
with  young  men  in  the  gymnasium  and  garden 
of  the  Academy  were  conducted  with  the  same 
union  of  ease  and  stately  decorum  as  mark  his 
sketches  of  the  greater  sophists.  One  remembers 
the  scene  at  the  house  of  Callias  that  early  morn- 
ing when  Socrates  was  carried  thither  to  hear, 
and  to  confound,  the  wisdom  of  the  doctors. 
There  was  Protagoras  walking  in  the  portico 
with  three  honourable  men  at  his  right  hand 
and  three  at  his  left,  followed  behind  by  a  train 
of  listeners  who  like  drilled  soldiers  wheeled 
about  as  the  leader  turned  at  either  end  of  his 
path.     In  the  opposite  portico  on  a  chair  of 


328  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

State  sat  Hippias,  with  solemn  authority  exalting 
the  principles  of  natural  philosophy  to  a  circle 
of  disciples  ranged  around  on  lower  benches. 
While  in  a  room  prepared  for  the  occasion 
Prodicus,  the  all-wise  and  inspired  teacher, 
lay  still  in  bed,  wrapped  up  in  many  skins  and 
coverlets,  expounding  his  doctrine  to  a  group 
of  admiring  youths.  His  deep  voice,  we  are 
told,  so  echoed  in  the  bare  room  that  those 
outside,  though  hearing  the  rumour,  could  not 
distinguish  his  words;  but  it  is  fair  to  suppose 
he  was  defending  his  theory  of  the  gods  as  mere 
allegorical  personifications  of  objects  which  had 
been  found  useful  to  man.  Something  of  the 
dignified  familiarity  of  that  scene  we  love  to 
summon  up  when  we  think  of  Plato  disputing 
with  his  pupils  on  the  nature  of  the  soul  and  on 
its  eternal  thirst  for  beauty  and  holiness. 

But  however  vague  our  picture  of  the  man 
Plato  and  his  method  of  teaching  must  be,  we 
are  left  in  no  such  uncertainty  regarding  the 
tenor  of  what  he  taught.  He  may  himself  have 
changed  in  minor  points  as  he  grew  from  youth 
to  age,  schoolmen  may  differ  ingeniously  over 
the  relation  of  this  and  that  tenet  to  various 
metaphysical  systems,  but  the  world  in  general 
has  never  doubted  to  what  groups  of  moral 
and  mental  traits  the  name  Platonism  should 
be  accorded,  and  what  type  of  men  through 
all  the  revolutions  of  thought  should  be  held 


PLATO  329 

the  true  bearers  of  the  tradition.  It  is  proper 
now,  as  it  was  in  Cicero's  day,  to  divide  man- 
kind into  two  classes  and  to  designate  those 
who  are  dissident  to  Plato  and  Socrates  and 
their  family  as  vulgar  minds — plebeii  philosophi. 
With  due  allowance  for  the  misleading  com- 
pleteness of  all  such  formulee  the  aim  of  Plato 
might  be  summed  up  in  a  substitution  of  the 
inner  witness  for  custom  and  in  an  appeal  from 
the  many  to  the  one. 

The  dramatic  nodus  is  the  superficial  affinity  of 
Socrates  with  the  new  brood  of  sophists  and  his 
essential  hostility  to  them.  Now  the  sophists 
formed  in  no  sense  a  closed  school  of  thinkers. 
They  taught  what  seemed  to  them  individually 
good,  and  while  some  professed  a  superiority 
to  the  claims  of  popular  ethics,  others  dealt, 
apparently,  with  purely  objective  matters  and 
were  disseminators  of  useful  knowledge.  But 
withal  they  were  united  by  a  common  tendency. 
They  arose  at  a  time  when  the  Greek  mind, 
having  passed  through  many  stages  and  having 
come  into  contact  at  many  points  with  the  sur- 
rounding world,  was  growing  restive  under  in- 
herited restraints;  and  they  met  this  uneasiness 
by  encouraging  men  to  look  at  the  present 
facts  of  life  and  nature  rather  than  at  the 
opinions  handed  down  from  the  past.  In  a 
way  they  offered  to  the  fifth  century  before 
Christ  what  the  grand  sophism  of  science  has 


330  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

given  to  the  present  age.  They  would  have  sub- 
scribed heartily  to  the  words  of  Huxley :  "Natural 
knowledge,  seeking  to  satisfy  natural  wants, 
has  found  the  ideas  which  can  alone  still  spirit- 
ual cravings.  .  .  .  The  improver  of  natural 
knowledge  absolutely  refuses  to  acknowledge 
authority,  as  such.  For  him  scepticism  is  the 
highest  of  duties;  blind  faith  the  one  unpardon- 
able sin."i  And  this  loyalty  to  natural  know- 
ledge they  extended  to  include  the  whole  being 
of  man.  "Of  the  gods,"  said  Protagoras, 
"I  cannot  know  that  they  exist  or  that  they 
do  not  exist";  of  one  thing  I  am  sure,  that 
"  man  is  the  measure  of  all  things."  The  mean- 
ing of  that  famous  saying,  avOpwTro^  fiirpov, 
becomes  perfectly  clear  from  Plato's  worrying 
of  it,  and  from  its  application  by  other  sophists. 
When  one  of  these  declared  that  "right  and 
wrong  do  not  exist  in  nature,  but  through  con- 
vention," and  when  another  averred  that  the 
gods  were  only  the  cunning  device  of  some 
lawgiver  "darkening  truth  with    a    lie,"  they 

iThe  association  of  a  Huxley  with  the  sophists  of 
Greece  is  justified  by  his  renewal  of  their  ancient 
feud.  "Platonic  philosophy,"  he  says,  "is  probably 
the  grandest  example  of  the  unscientific  use  of  the 
imagination  extant;  and  it  would  he  hard  to  estimate 
the  amount  of  detriment  to  clear  thinking  effected, 
directly  and  indirectly,  by  the  theory  of  ideas,  on  the 
one  hand,  and  by  the  unfortunate  doctrine  of  the 
baseness  of  matter,  on  the  other." 


PLATO  331 

meant  to  say  that  there  is  nothing  in  human 
nature  corresponding  to  the  assertions  of  uni- 
versal morality  and  religion:  on  the  one  side 
stands  the  illusion  of  traditional  belief  imposed 
on  the  people  by  society  for  its  preservation; 
on  the  other  side  is  the  reality  that  right  and 
wrong  are  measured  to  each  man  by  his  indi- 
vidual advantage.  The  religious  instinct  is  a 
convention;  nature,  the  only  and  the  whole  re- 
ality, is  a  mere  complex  of  stronger  and  weaker 
forces.  "What  is  base,  unless  to  the  doer  it 
seem  so?"  wrote  Euripides,  in  one  of  those  lines 
that  made  the  conclusions  of  scepticism  familiar 
in  the  mouths  of  the  people.  To  which  Plato  is 
said  to  have  retorted  categorically:  "The  base 
is  base,  whether  it  seem  so  or  not" — ala-xpov  to 

•y'atcr^pov,   Krjv  SoKrj  Krjv  firj  ooKy. 

Now  to  a  certain  point  Socrates  went  with  the 
sophists.  He,  too,  saw  that  it  was  no  longer 
possible  to  order  conduct  by  an  unthinking  obed- 
ience to  convention,  that  there  was  no  absolute 
harmony  between  convention  (vo/ios)  and  nature 
(^uo-is) ,  and  his  mission  was  to  go  about  convinc- 
ing men  of  their  ignorance  of  the  real  meaning  of 
justice  and  virtue  and  other  words  that  moved 
so  glibly  on  their  tongues.  How  he  laid  on 
himself  this  task  of  purging  the  popular  mind, 
may  be  seen  in  the  Apology.  To  the  gossipers 
in  the  streets,  and  to  many  graver  minds  who 
were  alarmed  at  the  inroad  on  every  side  of 


332  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

dubious  innovations,  it  may  well  have  seemed 
that  Socrates  was  one  of  the  chief  forces  working 
for  the  dissolution  of  the  State;  and  as  such 
they  put  him  away.  In  making  man  the  meas- 
ure of  all  things  the  sophists  thought  of  the 
individual  differences  among  men  and  of  the 
changes  in  each  man  himself  from  day  to  day, 
and  so  destroyed  the  basis  of  any  common  and 
imperative  law  of  morality;  they  subscribed  to 
the  philosophy  of  flux  and  of  the  many.  In 
using  the  same  formula  Socrates  had  his  eye 
rather  on  what  is  universal  to  all  men  and  above 
nature  as  the  mother  of  change,  and  so  sought 
to  establish  a  law  more  deeply  rooted  than  con- 
vention which  is  but  the  variable  shadow  of  that 
law.  But  were  the  citizens  of  Athens  to  know  that 
behind  his  rage  of  universal  inquiry  lay  the  great- 
est affirmation  and  conservative  force  the  world 
has  known?  Indeed,  so  far  as  we  can  see  now, 
the  higher  unity  of  the  spirit  which  should 
supplant  the  authority  of  tradition  was  im- 
plied rather  than  clearly  announced  by  Socrates. 
It  was  the  mission  of  his  disciple  to  develop  this 
truth. 

Plato  began,  as  did  Socrates,  with  the  purg- 
ing away  of  cant  and  complacent  ignorance. 
From  his  master  he  had  learnt  first  of  all  the 
necessity  of  distinguishing  between  words  and 
things.  This  is  not  to  say  that  he  was  a  rash 
innovator,  to  whom  custom  and  tradition  were 


PLATO  S33 

in  themselves  hindrances.  Within  his  capacious 
mind  time  lay  in  all  its  fulness,  and  to  his 
fertile  imagination  the  passing  of  wisdom  from 
generation  to  generation  was  like  those  races 
at  the  Peiraeus  in  which  horsemen  carrying 
lighted  torches  handed  them  from  one  to  another. 
No  writer  has  ever  dwelt  more  lovingly  on  the 
sheer  beauty  and  reverence  of  old  ways  than  he 
in  his  picture  of  the  ancient  Cephalus,  seated 
on  a  cushioned  chair  and  wearing  a  garland  on 
his  head,  after  ministering  at  the  home  sacri- 
fice. "There  is  nothing  which  for  my  part  I 
like  better,  Cephalus,"  he  says  through  the 
mouth  of  Socrates,  "than  conversing  with  aged 
men;  for  I  regard  them  as  travellers  who  have 
gone  a  journey  which  I  too  may  have  to  go."^ 
And  there  are  passages  in  his  later  works  {e.  g., 
Laws,  889  E)  that  prove  how  deeply  he  had 
pondered  the  steadying  force  of  convention 
as  embodying  an  experience  of  life  wider  and 
more  surely  based  than  that  of  any  single 
member  of  society.  But  he  saw  too  that, 
though  the  customs  of  religion  and  patriotism 
had  remained,  the  moral  force  behind  them  had 
weakened  ;  he  perceived  that  in  an  age  of  scep- 
tical self-consciousness  tradition  might  even  be 
abused  for  evil  ends,  and  that  authority  must 
depend  at  the  last  on  an  answering  conviction  in 

»This  and  the  other  larger  extracts  from  Plato  in 
this  essay  are  taken  from  Jowett's  translation. 


334  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

the  breast  of  each  man.  It  is  the  manner  of 
the  master  combined  with  the  literary  art  of  the 
disciple  we  seem  to  get  in  such  a  dialogue  as 
that  in  which  Euthyphro  argues  gravely  with 
Socrates  over  the  grounds  of  right  and  wrong. 
For  the  young  enthusiast  it  is  enough  to  know 
and  practise  what  is  dear  to  the  gods  as  we  see 
them  portrayed  by  the  poets,  and  in  this  pious 
assurance  he  has  prepared  to  commit  an  act 
heinous  to  humanity.  Not  without  a  pathetic 
hesitation  Socrates  leads  his  undoubting  friend 
into  self-contradictions,  and  shows  him  that, 
whatever  piety  may  be,  it  cannot  be  defined 
absolutely  by  any  such  external  rule. 

For  these  blind  enthusiasts  who  followed  the 
letter  rather  than  the  spirit  of  tradition,  Plato, 
like  Socrates,  had  unfailing  compassion.  His 
scorn  was  reserved  for  those  who,  in  place  of  a 
divinely  or  humanly  established  social  order,  set 
up  an  unrestrained  individualism.  There  were 
Nietzscheans  then  as  now,  men  who  believed 
that  might  is  right  and  acknowledged  no  law 
but  the  survival  of  the  fit.  Such  an  one  was  the 
sophist  Thrasymachus,  whom  Plato  represents 
as  rashly  venturing  to  instruct  Socrates  in  the 
nature  of  justice.  The  world  is  a  fool,  he  swears 
roundly,  and  if  virtue  is  desirable  then  virtue  is 
precisely  what  people  have  been  gulled  into 
naming  injustice  but  is  the  true  justice.  Justice 
is  the  profit  of  the  individual  who  grasps  and 


PLATO  335 

holds  what  he  can,  the  victory  of  the  strong 
over  the  weak.  With  patient  irony  Socrates, 
as  we  read  the  story  in  The  Republic,  listens 
and  questions  and  throws  his  antagonist  from 
one  blustering  contradiction  into  another,  until 
even  that  champion  of  force  is  obliged  to  admit 
that  happiness  is  not  coincident  with  grati- 
fication of  one's  desires  or  with  dominion  over 
others,  and  that  virtue  and  vice,  justice  and 
injustice,  are  meaningless  words  unless  referred 
to  no  external  standard  but  to  the  health  of  a 
man's  soul  itself.  For,  if  you  look  into  the 
matter,  you  will  find  that  this  form  of  Nietz- 
schean  individualism  is  no  more  self-sufficient 
than  its  Rousselian  counterpart  or  than  un- 
questioning adherence  to  authority.  Whether 
the  aim  is  to  gratify  desire  by  domination  over 
others,  or  to  disguise  desire  by  sympathy  with 
others,  or  to  regulate  desire  by  the  opinion 
of  others,  always  the  man  himself  is  kept  in  a 
state  of  unbalanced  perturbation  as  this  or  that 
element  of  his  nature  is  aggravated  or  depressed 
by  contact  with  the  world. 

And  so,  having  displayed  the  inadequacy  of 
any  rule  of  conduct  that  stops  with  the  mere 
negation  of  convention  and  of  the  social  illusion, 
Plato  enters  upon  the  great  argument  of  The 
Republic.  What  is  the  character  of  this  inner 
state  of  health  to  which  we  must  look  for  virtue 
and  its  rewards  in  place  of  outer  standards? 


^2,6  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

Now,  however  the  mystery  of  our  personality 
may  finally  reveal  itself,  we  are  not,  as  we  live 
and  feel,  simple  creatures.  There  is,  for  instance, 
the  reasoning  faculty  that  weighs  and  decides; 
there  is  the  sensuous  faculty  that  desires  and 
repels;  there  is  between  them  the  faculty  that 
converts  choice  into  action.  Virtue,  in  common 
speech,  has  been  parcelled  out  and  has  received 
different  names  as  it  concerns  one  or  the  other 
of  these  faculties: — wisdom  the  healthy  activity 
of  the  reason,  temperance  of  the  appetites, 
courage  of  the  will.  But  in  sooth  real  virtue  is 
one  and  not  many ;  it  is  the  health  and  happiness 
of  the  whole  soul,  whereas  the  virtue  of  each 
faculty  may  have  the  effect  of  vice  if  exercised 
without  proper  subordination ;  it  may  be  called 
justice,  in  so  far  as  it  signifies  a  just  equipoise 
of  the  faculties,  permitting  each  to  fulfil  its  own 
office  without  encroaching  on  the  rights  and 
duties  of  the  others.  Thus  it  is  not  courage,  but 
rashness,  when  the  will  impells  a  man  into  dan- 
ger without  listening  to  reason;  it  is  not  temper- 
ance, but  meanness  of  spirit,  when  a  man  refrains 
from  his  appetites  through  weakness  of  will. 
And  Plato,  who  all  along  is  illustrating  the  life 
of  the  soul  by  the  larger  life  of  society,  likens 
this  balance  of  the  faculties  to  that  stable  ef- 
ficiency in  the  State  which  arises  from  a  normal 
division  of  labour : 

And  the  division  of  labour  which  required  the  car- 


PLATO  337 

penter  and  the  shoemaker  and  the  rest  of  the  citizens 
to  be  doing  each  his  own  business,  and  not  another's, 
was  a  shadow  of  justice,  and  for  that  reason  it  was  of 
use? 

Clearly. 

But  in  reality  justice  was  such  as  we  were  describing, 
being  concerned,  however,  not  with  the  outward 
man,  but  with  the  inward,  which  is  the  true  self  and 
concernment  of  man:  for  the  just  man  does  not  permit 
the  several  elements  within  him  to  interfere  with  one 
another,  or  any  of  them  to  do  the  work  of  others, — 
he  sets  in  order  his  own  inner  life,  and  is  his  own  master 
and  his  own  law,  and  at  peace  with  himself;  and  when 
he  has  bound  together  the  three  principles  within  him, 
which  may  be  compared  to  the  higher,  lower,  and 
middle  notes  of  the  scale,  and  the  intermediate  inter- 
vals— when  he  has  bound  all  these  together,  and  is  no 
longer  many,  but  has  become  one  entirely  temperate 
and  perfectly  adjusted  nature,  then  he  proceeds  to 
act,  if  he  has  to  act,  whether  in  a  matter  of  property, 
or  in  the  treatment  of  the  body,  or  in  some  affair  of 
politics  or  private  business;  always  thinking  and  calling 
that  which  preserves  and  co5perates  with  this  harmo- 
nious condition,  just  and  good  action,  and  the  knowledge 
which  presides  over  it,  wisdom;  and  that  which  at  any 
time  impairs  this  condition,  he  will  call  unjust  action, 
and  the  opinion  which  presides  over  it,  ignorance.  > 

»  There  is  a  certain  profit  in  drawing  out  a  comparison 
of  the  pagan  and  Christian  virtues  into  a  scholastic 
table.  So0fo,  prudentia,  wisdom  in  human  affairs, 
corresponds  to  irlan^,  fides,  faith  toward  God,  both 
being  the  special  virtue  of  the  reasoning  faculty,  or 
'XoyiffTtKdv;  dvSpela,  fortitudo,  courage,  corresponds 
to  Airfs,  spes,  hope,  of  the  dv/juxLSh;  (TU(ppo<r{ivi), 
temper  antia,      temperance,      corresponds     to      a-^/iT-q, 


338  SHELBURNE    ESSAYS 

Nor,  as  may  be  seen  from  such  a  comparison, 
is  this  conception  of  justice  as  the  inner  balance 
and  unity  of  the  man  himself  in  any  way  related 

charitas,  love,  of  the  iTnOvurjTiKdv.  In  the  Platonic 
development  the  pagan  virtues  must  be  considered 
as  complemented  by  the  theory  of  ideas.  Thus 
ffocpia,  wisdom,  may  properly  be  reckoned  under  the 
idea  of  rb  d\Tjdh,  the  true;  dvSpeia,  courage,  under 
rb  Ka\6v,  the  beautiful;  <T(j}(l)po<7iv7},  temperance,  under 
rb  dyadbv,  the  good.  In  such  a  comparison,  we  see  how 
the  Platonic  idealisation  of  the  higher  element  of  man's 
nature  takes  the  place  of  the  Christian  personifi- 
cation of  this  element  as  God.  Nor  does  the  analogy 
cease  here.  As  shown  by  the  Golden  Rule  {dya-n-/i(reis, 
K.  T.  X.),  dydirt),  charitas,  performs  a  double  office  in 
the  Christian  scheme,  including  both  love  of  God  and 
love  of  one's  neighbour.  Similarly,  in  Platonism,  SiKaio- 
civT],  justice,  and  aw^pocruvq,  temperance,  are  substan- 
tially but  two  faces  of  the  same  virtue.  Both  result  in 
a  harmony  and  loving  cooperation  among  the  faculties 
of  a  man  (see,  for  justice,  Repb.  351  T) ,  rj  bk  biKaioaivi] 
ofiSvoiav  Kal  <pL\lav, — for  temperance,  Repb.  442  C, 
ffdKppova  oi)  ry  ^i\[(f.  Kal  ^v/jL(po}vlq.;).  But  justice  is 
this  virtue  in  the  larger  sense,  embracing  all  the 
others  and  looking  toward  the  mystical  life  of  man 
in  the  light  of  the  supreme  idea  of  the  good;  whereas 
temperance  is  rather  the  practical  balance  of  a  man's 
faculties  as  a  social  being.  We  may  tabulate  the 
two  orders  thus : 

biKaioaivTj  =  ordo  antoris  erga  sunimum  honunt 
dyd-rrr]  =  "  "  "      deunt 

a-u^pocr^vT]  =  ordo  amoris  in  homine 
dydirt]  -  "        "      inter  homines. 


PLATO  339 

to  what  is  ordinarily  called  egotism  or  indifferent- 
ism.  The  just  man  is  truly  integer  vitce,  "one 
and  not  many, "  he  who  acts  from  the  central 
force  of  his  whole  being  and  not  from  shifting 
and  unaccountable  impulses.  He  is  the  man  who, 
because  each  of  his  members  is  doing  its  own 
business,  whether  ruling  or  ruled,  will  conform 
to  a  similar  idea  of  the  State,  rendering  to  each 
citizen  what  is  his  due,  incapable  of  theft  or 
sacrilege  or  treachery  or  adultery  or  irreligion. 
It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  none  of  these 
details  of  conduct  is  overlooked  by  Plato  as 
evidence  of  the  soul's  internal  equipoise. 

And  this  virtuous  harmony  of  the  faculties 
is  only  the  practical  aspect  of  the  philosophical 
thesis  of  the  many  and  the  one  which  runs  all 

By  such  a  scheme  one  sees  how  easy  it  was  for  Platonism 
and  Christianity  to  melt  together  into  a  religious 
philosophy  which  possessed  something  of  the  free 
idealism  of  the  former  and  the  personal  enthusiasm 
of  the  latter.  It  is  this  combination,  exquisitely  fresh 
and  lovely,  however  unstable,  that  makes  the  charm 
of  so  many  English  poets  and  preachers  of  the  seven- 
teenth century.  It  forms  the  avowed  theme  also  of 
Spenser's  Hymn  of  Heavenly  Beauty : 

Faire  is  the  heaven  where  happy  soules  have  place, 

In  full  enjoyment  of  felicitie. 

Whence  they  doe  still  behold  the  glorious  face 

Of  the  Divine  Eternall  Majestic; 

More  faire  is  that  where  those  Idees  on  hie 

Enraunged  be,  which  Plato  so  admyred, 

And  pure  Intelligences  from  God  inspyred. 


340  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

through  the  Platonic  dialogues,  appearing  most 
frequently  as  the  opposition  between  opinion 
and  knowledge.  On  this  side  are  the  phenomena 
of  sensation,  which  by  reason  of  their  unrelated 
multiplicity  cannot  be  said  to  be  but  to  seem, 
mere  semblances  or  shadows,  altering  with  the 
alteration  of  time,  melting  together  and  drifting 
apart,  affording  to  the  observer  only  a  like  un- 
fixable  opinion.  On  the  other  side  are  the 
ideas  of  these  objects  or  sensations  as  they 
appear  to  the  abstracting  and  combining  power 
of  the  mind;  not  these  individual  men  whom 
we  behold  walking  about,  but  the  simple  in- 
divisible idea  of  humanity  by  which  we  say  this 
is  a  man;  not  the  various  objects  of  beauty 
which  delight  the  eye,  but  the  idea  of  beauty 
itself  by  which  we  distinguish  them  as  beautiful. 
The  idea  does  not  exist  in  nature,  if  nature  be 
confined  to  the  phenomenal  world,  but,  as  the 
property  of  the  mind,  is  to  the  mind  the  real- 
ity and  the  only  thing  of  which  the  mind  can 
have  true  cognizance.  The  business  of  philoso- 
phy is  just  to  turn  a  man  away  from  things  of 
opinion  to  things  of  knowledge,  as  Plato  sym- 
bolised in  his  wonderful  simile  of  the  cave. 
Every  body  is  familiar  with  that  allegory  of  the 
men  who  from  infancy  have  lived  in  a  sort  of 
underground  den,  sitting  with  their  legs  and 
necks  chained  so  that  they  can  see  only  straight 
before    them.      Behind    them    is    a   fire,    and 


PLATO  341 

between  the  fire  and  them  a  low  wall  like  a 
screen,  which  covers  the  bodies  of  other  men 
walking  back  and  forth  and  carrying,  above 
the  level  of  the  screen,  various  objects  whose 
shadows  are  cast  by  the  fire  on  the  wall  opposite 
the  prisoners.  Thus  the  prisoners  behold  their 
own  shadows  and  the  shadows  of  the  objects 
carried  behind  them,  but  cannot  see  the  fire  or 
the  carriers  who  talk  among  themselves  as  they 
pass.  These  shadows  are  the  world  to  them, 
and  nothing  more.  And  then  one  of  them  is 
released  and  turned  about  so  as  to  face  the  mov- 
ing objects  and  the  fire.  For  a  while  his  eyes  will 
be  dazzled,  and  he  will  fancy  the  shadows  to 
which  he  was  accustomed  are  more  real  than 
the  objects  upon  which  he  now  looks.  But 
this  is  only  the  beginning  of  his  bewilderment. 
Presently  he  is  dragged  up  the  length  of  the 
cave  to  the  brighter  light  of  day,  where  the 
radiance  of  the  sun  at  first  blinds  him,  so  that 
only  after  resting  his  eyes  upon  shadows,  and 
then  upon  reflections  in  the  water,  and  then  upon 
the  illuminated  objects  themselves,  will  he  be 
able  to  glance  upward  toward  the  great  lumin- 
ary of  the  sky,  and  learn  that  the  sun  is  he  who 
gives  the  seasons  and  the  years,  the  guardian  of 
all  things,  and  in  a  way  the  one  great  cause  of 
all,  even  of  the  fire  and  the  shadows  which  made 
the  life  of  the  prisoners  in  the  cave. 

Such,  Plato  would  say,  is  the  course  of  the 


342  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

soul  of  man,  immersed  in  the  world  of  the  senses, 
bound  within  the  shadowy  circle  of  opinions,  and 
only  by  a  long  and  difficult  ascent  brought  into 
the  radiant  sphere  of  ideas  and  knowledge.  Much 
has  been  written  about  these  Platonic  ideas, 
which  to  many  have  been  the  scandal  of  philo- 
sophy; and  for  this  their  author,  it  must  be 
admitted,  is  partly  responsible.  Instead  of 
abiding  humbly  in  his  allegorical  figure  and 
acknowledging  the  impossibility  of  unfolding  the 
causal  nexus  between  the  one  and  the  many, 
ideas  and  phenomena,  he  must,  like  other 
metaphysicians,  undertake  their  absolute  recon- 
ciliation; and  men  coming  to  him  and  detect- 
ing the  flaws  in  these  arguments  have  scoffed 
at  the  facts  themselves.  Instead  of  recognising 
that  opinion,  or  the  sense  of  individual  phenom- 
ena, is  in  itself  as  much  a  fact  of  experience  as 
the  knowledge  of  ideas,  and  that  our  ignorance 
is  not,  precisely  speaking,  of  phenomena  but  of 
the  relation  of  phenomena  to  the  ideal  world,  he 
has  attempted  to  reduce  the  world  in  which 
most  men  feel  their  dominant  interest  to  a  blank 
negation.  Yet  withal  it  cannot  be  gainsaid 
that  ideas  are  the  deciding  shibboleth  of  Plato's 
doctrine,  and  that  by  our  acceptance  or  rejection 
of  these  we  are  reckoned  as  Platonists  or  plebeii 
philosophi.  For  in  the  end  it  comes  to  this 
simple  thing:  as  a  man  becomes  more  and  more 
concerned  with  the  conversion  of  the  material 


PLATO  343 

of  sensuous  experience  into  food  for  his  spiritual 
life  he  inevitably  attaches  greater  weight  and 
importance,  greater  reality  we  may  call  it  from 
his  new  point  of  view,  to  the  unifying  ideas 
among  which  the  spirit  moves.  His  reflection  on 
beauty  becomes  more  real  to  him  than  the 
manifold  objects  from  which  that  idea  is  ab- 
stracted. Nor  can  the  materialist  claim  that 
his  boasted  adherence  to  reality  depends  on  any- 
thing else  but  a  differently-directed  mental 
tendency.  He  who  accepts  as  real  only  the 
individual  object  perceived  by  the  senses,  must 
immediately  discover  that  this  object  is  itself 
composed  of  parts,  and  these  parts  of  others, 
and  so  by  the  inevitable  flow  of  analysis  he 
will  be  led  to  the  purely  immaterial  conception 
of  atoms  as  a  desperately  held  resting-place  for 
the  mind.  That  process  is  thus  the  mental 
opposite  of  Plato's  dialectic,  which,  while  shun- 
ning an  attempt  through  reason  to  reconcile  in- 
compatibles,  and  thus  escaping  the  wastes  of 
rationalism  (when  caught  in  that  error  he  is  false 
to  his  own  system) ,  rises  by  a  series  of  syntheses 
ever  nearer  to  the  convergence  of  all  concep- 
tions in  one  infinite,  self-sufficient  idea.  "  This," 
he  says,  at  the  conclusion  of  his  metaphor 
of  the  cave, — "this  is  that  strain  which  is 
of  the  intellect  only,  but  which  the  faculty  of 
sight  will  nevertheless  be  found  to  imitate; 
for  sight,  as  you  may  remember,  was  imagined 


344  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

by  us  after  a  while  to  behold  the  real  animals 
and  stars,  and  last  of  all  the  sun  himself.  And 
so  with  dialectic;  when  a  person  starts  on  the 
discovery  of  the  absolute  by  the  light  of  reason 
only,  and  without  any  assistance  of  sense,  and 
perseveres  until  by  pure  intelligence  he  arrives 
at  the  perception  of  the  absolute  good,  he  at 
last  finds  himself  at  the  end  of  the  intellectual 
world,  as  in  the  other  case  at  the  end  of  the 
visible." 

And  so  at  the  summit  of  this  new  Jacob's 
ladder,  in  the  highest  vault  of  the  spiritual 
heaven  stands  the  supreme  all-bountiful  goal 
of  our  striving  and  our  long  renunciations.  No 
man  in  this  earthly  state  can  gaze  steadily  on 
that  immeasurable  and  awful  splendour,  as  no 
man  can  hold  his  eye  unwinking  upon  the  visible 
sun  of  the  sky.  But  without  the  presence  of 
that  life-giving  luminary  in  his  mental  world  he 
must  stumble  amongst  uncertainties  and  un- 
related aims,  as  without  the  sun  he  will  move 
in  shadows  and  bodily  blindness.  He  is  the 
perfect  philosopher,  the  Platonic  saint,  in  whom 
the  idea  of  the  good  reigns  unclouded  and  sheds 
its  all-unifying  radiance ;  he  walks  in  the  day  of 
knowledge,  like  a  man  awake  among  sleepers 
and  dreamers  beneath  closed  eyelids.  It  is  not 
strange  that  he  should  see  no  meaning  in  the 
words  of  those  that  mutter  in  their  slumber, 
or  that  the  soul  which  has  such  magnificence  of 


PLATO  345 

conception  and  is  the  spectator  of  all  time  and 
all  being  should  think  meanly  of  human  life. 
At  the  furthest  remove  from  him  is  the  complete 
sophist,  like  the  many-headed  hydra,  as  Socrates 
playfully  calls  him,  never  in  any  sense  truly 
himself,  but  dependent  for  his  motives  on  the 
manifold,  ever-changing  world,  and  the  insati- 
able and  at  the  last  tormenting  brood  of 
desires  that  go  out  toward  that  world.  In  this 
tumultuous  life  he  acquires  a  kind  of  cunning 
versatility  which  is  the  admiration  of  his 
fellows,  but  for  anything  beyond  their  ken  he 
and  they  have  an  ignoble  contempt. 

In  this  final  contrast  of  the  limits  of  knowledge 
and  opinion,  of  the  perfect  philosopher  and  the 
absolute  sophist,  we  are  brought  face  to  face 
with  the  same  infinitely  remote  extremes  as 
made  the  religion  of  India.  Only,  in  practice, 
there  is  this  important  divergence  in  the  atti- 
tude of  the  Greek  and  the  Hindu.  The  latter 
saw  and,  in  general,  proclaimed  that  antinomy 
in  its  naked  austerity,  with  no  pity  for  the 
suspended  soul,  with  little  recognition  of  the 
necessary  compromises  of  life  or  of  the  slow 
groping  by  which  we  mount  from  darkness  into 
light.  To  all  but  the  divinely  constituted  few, 
the  veritable  elect,  there  is  more  of  peril  than  of 
comfort  in  approaching  the  unveiled  goddess  of 
truth ;  blinded  by  that  terrible  light  they  are  too 
apt  to  turn  away,  denying  that  they  have  looked 


346  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

into  aught  save  a  vast  emptiness,  and  making 
their  humiliation  an  excuse  for  bending  the  knee 
to  every  base  idol  of  the  streets.  From  this 
harsher  aspect  of  dualism  Plato  was  preserved 
by  his  Greek  nature.  He  who  searches  will 
find  in  his  works  this  absolute  antinomy,  without 
which,  indeed,  his  philosophy  would  be  no  more 
than  the  floating  hither  and  thither  on  a  shore- 
less sea.  But  the  heart  of  his  doctrine  is  just 
the  recognition  that  we  are  voyagers  to  the 
Blessed  Isles  and  not  yet  denizens  thereof.  Like 
one  knowing  the  winds  and  familiar  with  the 
stars,  he  would  be  to  us  a  pilot  on  the  way, 
steering  us  safely  over  hidden  reefs  and  through 
tempestuous  waves,  into  those  quieter  reaches 
whence  from  afar  we  may  catch  odours  of  blos- 
soming trees,  and  even  at  rarer  moments  hear, 
faintly  blown,  the  strains  of  celestial  music,  and 
know  surely  that  some  day  we  shall  drop  an- 
chor at 

.    .    .  The  island- valley  of  Avilion; 
Where  falls  not  hail,  or  rain,  or  any  snow. 
Nor  ever  wind  blows  loudly;  but  it  lies 
Deep-meadow' d,  happy,  fair  with  orchard  lawns 
And  bowery  hollows  crown'd  with  summer  sea. 

The  real  Platonism,  then,  is  not  a  dogmatic 
statement  of  the  truth,  but  a  continuous  approx- 
imation thereto,  which,  for  us  as  we  are  consti- 
tuted, is  more  veracious  than  truth;  it  is  not  a 
metaphysic,  but  a  discipline,  an  dvaywy^.     Into 


PLATO  347 

that  high  service  all  the  faculties  are  summoned 
— the  reason  first  of  all,  and  naturally,  in  that 
intellectual  strain,  or  dialectic,  of  which  the 
progress  of  the  cave-prisoners  from  shadows  to 
realities  was  a  symbol.  It  is  the  instrument 
by  which  we  consciously  pass  from  sensations 
to  ideas,  and  combine  these  into  ever  more 
comprehensive  ideas;  the  process  of  inner 
conversation,  or  self-questioning,  by  which  we 
regard  each  act  of  our  intellect  as  a  stepping- 
stone  to  raise  us  to  something  higher  and  more 
nearly  universal.  But  it  would  be  a  grave  error 
to  suppose  that  the  imagination  and  the  emotions 
were  omitted  in  this  philosophy.  Plato  has, 
no  doubt,  written  austerely  of  the  arts.  He  has 
not  spared  to  expose  their  insidious  power  of 
seducing  the  soul  by  casting  a  glamour  of  beauty 
over  her  vicious  appetites;  and  he  has  marked 
unflinchingly  the  debilitating  effect  upon  char- 
acter of  even  the  purest  imagination  when  it  is 
made  the  mistress  instead  of  the  servant,  and 
so  breaks  up  the  just  balance  of  the  faculties. 
But  Plato  knew  also  the  nobler  office  of  art, 
as  how,  indeed,  could  it  be  otherwise  with  one 
who  was  in  youth  himself  a  poet,  who  made 
himself  master  of  all  the  devices  of  the  rhetor- 
ician, and  whose  dramatic  subtlety  is  still  the 
unapproachable  model  for  the  critic  of  to-day, 
who  through  all  the  mazes  of  human  character 
and  temperament  would  track  the  spirit  of  man 


348  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

in  its  historic  search  for  truth?  The  safe  aid 
of  the  imagination  he  has  not  failed  to  note  in 
connection  with  his  figure  of  the  cave: 

But  the  release  of  the  prisoners  from  chains,  and 
their  translation  from  the  shadows  to  the  images  and  to 
the  light,  and  the  ascent  from  the  underground  den 
to  the  sun,  while  in  his  presence  they  are  vainly  trying 
to  look  on  animals  and  plants  and  the  light  of  the  sun, 
but  are  able  to  perceive  even  with  their  weak  eyes  the 
images  in  the  water  [which  are  divine],  and  are  the 
shadows  of  true  existence  (not  shadows  of  images  cast 
by  a  light  of  fire,  which  compared  with  the  sun  is  only 
an  image) — this  power  of  elevating  the  highest  prin- 
ciple in  the  soul  to  the  contemplation  of  that  which  is 
best  in  existence,  with  which  we  may  compare  the 
raising  of  that  faculty  which  is  the  very  light  of 
the  body  to  the  sight  of  that  which  is  brightest  in 
the  material  and  visible  world — this  power  is  given, 
as  I  was  saying,  by  all  that  study  and  pursuit  of  the 
arts  which  has  been  described. 

The  arts,  both  the  greater  and  the  less,  the 
fair  things  of  Hellas,  were  not  banished  from  the 
perfect  city  which  Plato  conceived  in  imagina- 
tion, but  regulated  and  purged  of  their  excesses 
and  trained  to  an  ascetic  chastity  of  grace. 
His  seeming  severity  toward  them  was  not 
that  of  the  utilitarian  which  betrays  a  bluntness 
to  the  finer  influences  of  beauty:  on  the  contrary 
he  had,  if  anything,  an  exaggerated  notion  of 
their  power  over  the  hidden  springs  of  action; 
and  if  he  watched  their  admission  with  rigor- 
ous jealousy,  it  was  because  they  were  to  be 


PLATO  349 

the  comely  handmaidens  of  the  rhythmically- 
moving  life,  true  helps  to  the  soul  in  its  task 
of  purifying  away  the  grosser  passions.  For, 
as  Socrates  is  made  to  say  in  The  Republic, 
"  goodness  of  speech  and  harmony  and  form  and 
rhythm  go  with  good-nature — not  with  that 
silliness  which  we  commonly  flatter  as  good- 
nature, but  the  character  that  springs  from  a 
well  and  nobly  disposed  understanding."  All 
the  accessories  of  life  are  ordered  by  these 
qualities;  they  determine  the  technique  of  paint- 
ing and  weaving  and  embroidery  and  build- 
ing and  the  making  of  vessels;  and  they  must 
equally  be  the  perpetual  norm  of  the  motions 
and  manners  and  pleasures  of  our  young  men, 
if  these  are  to  fulfil  the  supreme  art  of  living. 
More  particularly  the  true  citizen  must  from 
early  childhood  be  subjected  to  the  influence  of 
a  music  from  which  all  effeminate  and  luxurious 
strains  are  excluded,  and  which,  moving  in  accord 
with  the  moods  of  temperance  and  courage  and 
prudence,  will  train  the  soul  and  body  to  be 
themselves  a  kind  of  silent  harmony. 

Nor  were  the  emotions  any  more  neglected 
by  Plato  than  was  the  artistic  imagination,  of 
which  they,  purged  also  of  their  licentious 
wanderings  and  used  as  spurs  and  encourage- 
ment to  the  philosophic  ascent,  are  but  another 
phase.  "  Right  love,"  he  says,  summing  up  the 
emotions  under  their  most  comprehensive  name, 


3  50  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

— "right  love  is  to  love  temperately  and  musi- 
cally what  is  well-ordered  and  fair."  Mouo-i/cws 
ipav,  to  love  musically — how  the  words  awaken 
memories  of  the  long  passion  of  Platonism  that 
runs  like  a  scarlet  thread  through  the  grey 
annals  of  philosophy!  How  much  of  Christian- 
ity and  chivalry  and  ascetic  ecstasy  they  con- 
tain in  germ!  They  have  been  employed  as  a 
charm  by  poets  who,  inverting  the  right  order, 
would  contract  the  love  of  the  world  into  the 
love  of  a  woman.  They  possess  the  ambiguous 
fascination  that  trembles  on  the  verge  of  fatal 
illusion,  a  fascination  fit  either  to  save  or  to  slay. 
Yet,  as  we  read  the  PhcBdrus  and  Symposium 
in  which  the  mystery  of  Platonic  love  is  ex- 
pounded, there  should  seem  to  be  no  room  for 
these  dangerous  misunderstandings.  We  are 
sitting,  let  us  fancy,  with  Socrates  and  his  eager 
young  friend,  Phaedrus,  under  the  tall  plane-tree 
beside  the  Ilissus,  "  in  a  fair  and  shady  resting- 
place,  full  of  summer  sounds  and  scents";  and, 
after  much  bantering  talk  about  the  mischievous 
tricks  of  Eros,  the  older  man,  so  Plato  reports, 
would  lay  aside  his  masque  of  irony  and  utter  his 
recantation : 

...  But  of  beauty,  I  repeat  again  [we  take  him  up  in 
the  middle  of  his  discourse]  that  we  saw  her  there  shin- 
ing in  company  with  the  celestial  forms;  and  coming  to 
earth  we  find  her  here  too,  shining  in  clearness  through 
the  clearest  aperture  of  sense.     For  sight  is  the  most 


PLATO  351 

piercing  of  our  bodily  senses;  though  not  by  that  is 
wisdom  seen;  her  loveliness  would  have  been  trans- 
porting if  there  had  been  a  visible  image  of  her,  and 
the  other  ideas,  if  they  had  visible  counterparts,  would 
be  equally  lovely.  But  this  is  the  privilege  of  beauty, 
that  being  the  loveliest  she  is  also  the  most  palpable 
to  sight.  Now  he  who  is  not  newly  initiated  or  who 
has  become  corrupted,  does  not  easily  rise  out  of  this 
world  to  the  sight  of  true  beauty  in  the  other;  he  looks 
only  at  her  earthly  namesake,  and  instead  of  being 
awed  at  the  sight  of  her  he  is  given  over  to  pleasure, 
and  like  a  brutish  beast  he  rushes  on  to  enjoy  and  beget; 
he  consorts  with  wantonness,  and  is  not  afraid  or 
ashamed  of  pursuing  pleasure  in  violation  of  nature. 
But  he  whose  initiation  is  recent,  and  who  has  been  the 
spectator  of  many  glories  in  the  other  world,  is  amazed 
when  he  sees  any  one  having  a  godlike  face  or  any 
bodily  form  which  is  the  expression  of  divine  beauty; 
and  at  first  a  shudder  runs  through  him,  again  the  old 
awe  steals  over  him.  [Whereupon  follows  that  elabor- 
ate and  somewhat  fantastic  figure  of  the  expansion  of 
the  soul's  wings  under  the  warming  of  right  love,  and 
the  last  sublime  flight  thither  where  beauty  itself  shall 
once  more  be  visible  in  its  undivided,  indefectible 
essence.] 

We  saw  her  there  shining  in  company  with  the 
celestial  forms — Socrates  has  been  describing  the 
soul  as  carried  in  a  chariot  to  the  outer  dome  of 
the  sky, whence,  in  the  heaven  above  the  heavens, 
as  in  a  passing  vision  it  descries  the  realities 
of  which  the  things  of  this  world  are  but  faulty- 
imitations,  the  realities  which  are  the  ideas  of 
beauty,  wisdom,  goodness  and  their  divine  sister- 


352  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

hood.  Thus,  by  a  kind  of  religious  parable, 
the  growth  of  the  soul  through  the  imagination 
and  the  emotions  and  the  understanding  is  pict- 
ured as  an  upward  flight  and  transfiguration. 
From  the  contemplation  of  beauty  in  separate 
objects  we  rise  by  gradual  steps  to  the  vision  of 
beauty  itself  as  an  all-irradiating  power.  From 
the  love  of  individual  persons  we  expand  by  ever 
widening  circles  to  a  love  that  is  the  centre  of  all 
activities — "lovers  of  truth  and  of  that  which 
is,  such  are  philosophers."  And  these  sublime 
practices  of  the  souV  are  nothing  else  but  faith 
in  the  ideas  which  the  unifying  intellect  posited 
as  the  ends  of  its  dialectic  search,  the  imagina- 
tion giving  them  form  and  colour  by  its  power  of 
contemplating  them  as  symbolised  in  phenomena, 
the  emotions  giving  them  ^vitality  by  holding 
them  always  as  the  essential  concern  of  our  life. 
It  is  thus  by  the  energy  of  the  will,  acting  for 
the  faculties  bravely  in  their  incessant  choice, 
that  Plato  finds  that  practical  solution  of  the 
contradictions  of  the  soul  which  we  may  call 
the  progress  of  morality  toward  the  all-embrac- 
ing idea  of  the  good.  Character  is  the  orderly 
and  voluntary  passage  from  the  many  to  the 
one,  from  the  outer  to  the  inner.  "Show  me," 
he  says,  "  a  man  able  to  see  both  the  one  and 
the  many  in  nature,  and  I  will  follow  in  his 
footsteps  as  though  he  were  a  god."  Such  a 
reconciler    we    think    we    have   found    in    the 


PLATO  353 

Platonic  Socrates,    and    follow   him,    not   as   a 
god,  but  as  the  wisest  and  truest  of  men. 

And  as  these  ideas  are  the  infinite  verities 
of  the  soul,  they  seem  not  to  be  the  creation  of 
this  or  that  man  in  his  temporal  existence,  but 
the  life  of  humanity  regarded  sub  specie  ceterni- 
tatis.  To  you  and  me  they  come  not  as  the  child- 
ren of  time,  but  as  a  kind  of  self-discovery  by 
which  we  are  made  aware  of  our  own  participation 
in  eternity.  As  we  catch  glimpses  of  them  now  and 
then  through  the  clouds  of  our  lesser  interests, 
they  appear  rather  to  be  broken  memories  of 
an  experience  in  some  indefinitely  remote  past, 
as  if  our  present  life  were  but  a  sleep  and  a  for- 
getting, were  by  the  illusion  of  time  a  moment  in 
an  endless  chain  of  existences  reaching  before  and 
after.*  Again  they  may  be  personified,  these  ideas, 
as  deities  inhabiting  the  skies  and  descending 
upon  the  earth,  visible  thus  to  the  eye  of  faith 
and  calling  upon  men  to  imitate  their  holy  ways ; 
yet  they  are  still  withal  the  very  reality  of  our 
own  thinking,  so  that  the  religious  aim  of  all 
life,  the  becoming  like  to  God,  o/xotoxris  tw  $€&, 
may  be  not  a  transient  mythology  or  a  disput- 

>  Transmigration  is  thus  a  kind  of  symbolism  (ac- 
cepted with  terrible  seriousness  by  the  Hindus  but 
never  allowed  by  the  Greek  to  pass  beyond  the  stage 
of  fancy)  used  to  cover  the  impossibility  of  expressing 
rationally  the  bond  within  us  between  our  infinite 
and  our  finite  nature. 


354  SHELBURNE  ESSAYS 

able  dogma,  but  an  obedience  to  our  own  better 
Self,  the  victory  of  a  man  KpctTTwv  iavrov.  Phi- 
losophy is  here  not  like  the  inhuman  antithesis 
of  India  or  the  barren  eristic  of  the  schools;  it  is 

Not  harsh  and  crabbed,  as  dull  fools  suppose. 
But  musical  as  is  Apollo's  lute. 

These  are  but  a  handful  of  the  riches  from 
Plato's  inexhaustible  store ;  but  they  are  enough 
to  comfort  and  adorn  a  life.  He  who  has  been 
thoroughly  indoctrinated  in  that  wisdom  will 
walk  with  the  assurance  of  faith  amid  the  tribe 
of  opinions  and  sophisms  that  now,  as  in  Plato's 
day,  beset  the  course  of  man.  He  will  retain  a 
reverence  for  traditional  religion  as  for  one  of 
the  illusions  without  which  mankind  sinks  into 
the  slough  of  the  senses;  he  will  know,  as  Plato 
knew,  that  the  most  superstitious  idolater  may 
be  nearer  to  the  truth  than  the  emancipated 
sceptic;  but  he  will  know  also  on  what  found- 
ation of  his  own  soul  to  build  his  hopes  when 
myth  and  dogma  seem  to  be  crumbling  away. 
He  will  be  no  light-hearted  optimist,  for  he  has 
been  made  fearfully  aware  of  the  depth  of 
ignorance  and  depravity  that  opens  within  the 
human  breast.  He  will  be  no  humanitarian, 
casting  the  responsibility  of  his  sins  upon  some 
phantom  perversion  of  society  and  looking 
for  redemption  to  some  equally  phantom  work 
of  social  sympathy.     He  will  feel  the  compassion 


PLATO  355 

of  the  world;  but  he  will  be  convinced  that  the 
fateful  struggle  for  him,  as  for  each  man,  lies 
within  his  own  nature  and  is  for  the  possession 
of  himself. 


THE    END 


Shelburne  Essays 

By  Paul  Elmer  More 

6  vols.     Crown  octavo. 

Each,  net,  $1.25.    (By  mail,  $1.35) 

Contents 

First  Series:  A  Hermit's  Notes  on  Thoreau — The  Soli- 
tude of  Nathaniel  Hawthorne  —  The  Origins  of  Haw- 
thorne and  Poe — The  Influence  of  Emerson — The  Spirit 
of  Carlyle  —  The  Science  of  English  Verse  —  Arthur 
Symons  :  The  Two  Illusions — The  Epic  of  Ireland — 
Two  Poets  of  the  Irish  Movement — Tolstoy  ;  or.  The 
Ancient  Feud  between  Philosophy  and  Art  —  The  Re- 
ligious Ground  of  Humanitarianism. 

Second  Series  :  Elizabethan  Sonnets — Shakespeare's  Son- 
nets— Lafcadio  Hearn — The  First  Complete  Edition  of 
Hazlitt  —  Charles  Lamb — Kipling  and  FitzGerald  — 
George  Crabbe  —  The  Novels  of  George  Meredith  — 
Hawthorne:  Looking  before  and  after  —  Delphi  and 
Greek  Literature — Nemesis :  or,  The  Divine  Envy. 

Third  Series  :  The  Correspondence  of  William  Cowper — 
Whittier  the  Poet  —  The  Centenary  of  Sainte-Beuve — 
The  Scotch  Novels  and  Scotch  History — Swinburne- 
Christina  Rossetti — Why  is  Browning  Popular  ? — A  Note 
on  Byron's  "Don  Juan" — Laurence  Sterne — J.  Henry 
Shorthouse — The  Quest. 

Fourth  Series  :  The  Vicar  of  Morwenstow — Fanny  Bur- 
ney— A  Note  on  "  Daddy  "  Crisp — George  Herbert — John 
Keats — Benjamin  P'ranklin — Charles  Lamb  Again — Walt 
Whitman — William  Blake — The  Theme  of  Paradise  Lost 
— The  Letters  of  Horace  Walpole. 

Fifth  Series  :  The  Greek  Anthology  —  The  Praise  of 
Dickens — George  Gissing — Mrs.  Gaskell — Philip  Freneau 
— Thoreau's  Journal — The  Centenary  of  Longfellow — ■ 
Donald  G.  Mitchell— James  Thomson  ("  B.  V.")— Ches- 
terfield— Sir  Henry  Wotton. 

Sixth  Series  \Studies  of  Religious  Dualism^:  The  Forest 
Philosophy  of  India  —  The  Bhagavad  Gita  —  Saint 
Augustine — Pascal — Sir  Thomas  Browne — Bimyan — 
Rousseau — Socrates — The  Apology — Plato. 


A  Few  Press  Criticisms  on 
Shelburne  Essays 

"  It  is  a  pleasure  to  hail  in  Mr.  More  a  genuine  critic,  fot 
genuine  critics  in  America  in  these  days  are  uncommonly 
scarce.  .  .  .  We  recommend,  as  a  sample  of  his  breadth, 
style,  acumen,  and  power  the  essay  on  Tolstoy  in  the  present 
volume.  That  represents  criticism  that  has  not  merely 
a  metropolitan  but  a  world  note.  .  .  .  One  is  thoroughly 
grateful  to  Mr.  More  for  the  high  quality  of  his  thought,  his 
serious  purpose,  and  his  excellent  style." — Harvard  Gradu- 
ates* Magazine. 

"  We  do  not  know  of  any  one  now  writing  who  gives 
evidence  of  a  better  critical  equipment  than  Mr.  More.  It 
is  rare  nowadays  to  find  a  writer  so  thoroughly  familiar  with 
both  ancient  and  modern  thought.  It  is  this  width  of  view, 
this  intimate  acquaintance  with  so  much  of  the  best  that  has 
been  thought  and  said  in  the  world,  irrespective  of  local 
prejudice,  that  constitute  Mr.  More's  strength  as  a  critic. 
He  has  been  able  to  form  for  himself  a  sound  literary  canon 
and  a  sane  philosophy  of  life  which  constitute  to  our  mind 
his  peculiar  merit  as  a  critic." — Independent. 

'*  He  is  familiar  with  classical,  Oriental,  and  English 
literature;  he  uses  a  temperate,  lucid,  weighty^  and  not 
ungraceful  style ;  he  is  aware  of  his  best  predecessors,  and  is 
apparently  on  the  way  to  a  set  of  philosophic  principles 
which  should  lead  him  to  a  high  and  perhaps  influential 
place  in  criticism.  .  .  .  We  believe  that  we  are  in  the 
presence  of  a  critic  who  must  be  counted  among  the  first  who 
take  literature  and  life  for  their  theme." — London  Speaker^ 


G.    P.   Putnam's  Sons 
New  York  London 


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Fellow  of  Magdalene  College,  Cambridge 

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"It  is  a  graceful  charming  book,  lucidly  and  beautifully  written." — 
iV,  v.  Sun, 

SPECIAL  LIBRARY  EDITION  of  the  Upton    Letters— Beside    Still 
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Q.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


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Fellow  of  Magdalene  College 


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Crown  8vo.     Si.jo  net 

"Once  more  Mr.  Benson  has  put  forth  one  of  his  appealing  and  elo- 
quent studies  in  human  motive  ;  and  once  more  he  has  succeeded,  with 
unfailing  certainty  of  touch,  in  getting  out  of  his  study  a  remarkable  and 
impressive  effect.  — London  Chronicle. 

2nd  Impression 

The  Schoolmaster 

A  Commentary  upon  the  Aims  and  Methods  of  an  Assistant- 
Master  in  a  Public  Scliool 

A  Companion  Volume  to  "The  Upton  Letters" 

Crown  8vo.     $1.2^  net 

"  The  quaint  philosophy  of  life,  keen  insight  into  human  nature,  and 
delicate  appreciation  of  the  finer  sensibilities  inherent  in  even  the  average 
"small  boy's"  inner  consciousness  combine  in  making  the  volume  an 
agency  of  moral  uplift  as  well  as  an  educational  inspiration." — Columbus 
Despatch. 

"  Mr.  Benson  covers  the  whole  field  of  scholastic  life  and  everything 
that  he  writes  is  a  delight  to  read."~7"A*  Argonaut. 

2nd  Impression 

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Crown  8vo.     $i.jo  net 

In  the  essay  Mr.  Benson  is  at  his  best,  and  here  he  is  in  his  best  vein. 
An  atmosphere  of  rest  and  tranquil  thoughtfulness  envelops  the  reader, 
as  he  peruses  this  book  so  full  of  sage  reflection,  humor,  shrewd  observa- 
tion, and  serviceable  thought;  so  fluent,  accurate,  and  beautiful  in  style: 
so  pleasingly  varied  in  cadence.  Mr.  Benson's  books  have  been  well  called 
"  ministering  books,"  and  such  they  are  in  the  sense  that  they  present  to 
the  reader  a  great  number  of  ideas,  wise  thoughts,  and  suggestions  which 
can  be  successfully  put  into  practice  in  the  daily  round  and  common  task 
of  every  man's  life.  Indeed  it  is  the  combination  of  charm  of  manner  and 
humble  serviceableness  that  has  drawn  about  Mr.  Benson  his  large  circle 
of  friendly  and  appreciative  readers. 

Six  volumes  unifottn,  ia  a  boxi  At  Large — The  Schoolmaster 

— The  Upton  Letters — From  a  College  Window — 

Beside  Still  Waters—The  Altar  Fire 

Price,  ST'JO  net 

Q.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


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